
Suburb in the sky: how Jakartans built an entire village on top of a mall - charlysl
https://www.theguardian.com/cities/2019/aug/05/suburb-in-the-sky-how-jakartans-built-an-entire-village-on-top-of-a-mall
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blunte
I guess relative to other options in Jakara, Cosmo Park is quite nice.
However, the air quality in the city is so bad from Monday morning until
Saturday afternoon that I cannot imagine jogging or doing other outdoor
activities.

The air burns the throat and smells like fire and exhaust (especially from the
millions of 2-cycle engine scooters with no emissions systems). Like other
cities with terrible air, Jakarta will have to do something significant to
become more livable; otherwise, local lifespans will dive (are diving, but
will become obvious) over the next 20 years.

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Deimorz
Decently interesting article (more of an interesting subject than the article
itself), but I hate these current trends in article titles. There's absolutely
nothing in this article about how they built it.

~~~
chmod775
They would just have to drop the "How" to make it accurate.

Seems like a common mistake. Common enough that I now just ignore certain
words when parsing titles.

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9nGQluzmnq3M
Suburbs in the sky are unusual because they're not very space-efficient, but
fortress-like apartments-atop-mall complexes are quite common in Jakarta.
Here's one of the first, the Ciputra Mall complex (mall, hotel, apartments),
which any visitor to Jakarta will have seen because it's right next to the
highway from the airport:

[https://travel.detik.com/travel-news/d-2146644/selama-
banjir...](https://travel.detik.com/travel-news/d-2146644/selama-banjir-hotel-
ciputra-tidak-terima-pesan-kamar-)

And its newer, flashier cousins Ciputra Worlds 1 (built), 2 (u/c) and 3
(planned):

[http://www.ciputraworldjakarta.com/cwj1/](http://www.ciputraworldjakarta.com/cwj1/)

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INTPenis
Given the track record of improvised solutions in Asia I wonder as a layman if
the building engineers gave the green light for this with good conscience.

I mean the mall was clearly built first, with a certain structural integrity
in mind. And then an entire village was built on top of it.

~~~
lawlessone
" Cosmo Park is one of two such developments in Jakarta by the Indonesian
property developer the Agung Podomoro Group, and was built according to
regulations. The second is above the Mall of Indonesia in the city’s north."

Sounds like it was all built together.

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papa-whisky
Not really a 'village' like the one in the article, but I recently discovered
that there's a row of townhouses on top of a shopping centre in central
Melbourne:
[https://www.google.com.au/maps/@-37.8256146,144.9495821,168a...](https://www.google.com.au/maps/@-37.8256146,144.9495821,168a,35y,39.5t/data=!3m1!1e3)

~~~
grahamel
there is a similar thing in Brighton where there is a whole block of flats
built above (presumably at the same time) as a multistory car park

when you park there it does look like they were just dropped on top

[https://www.google.com.au/maps/place/Brighton/@50.8225466,-0...](https://www.google.com.au/maps/place/Brighton/@50.8225466,-0.1475139,79m/data=!3m1!1e3!4m5!3m4!1s0x48758509f6294167:0x9cc6af7a727d0ef9!8m2!3d50.82253!4d-0.137163)

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PhasmaFelis
I feel like the full-size two-lane roads go well past clever and into
fetishizing suburbia. The roads and car ports take up a huge amount of
precious space and force you to drive up and down 10 stories of ramp every
time, instead of parking lower in the garage (possibly with reserved spaces,
the place is expensive enough for that) and taking the elevator. I guess it's
handy when moving in/out, but again, for the cost, they could provide workers
with motorized carts to move your stuff for you. Just seems really impractical
with no upside, all to make you feel like you're having an "authentic suburban
experience" or something.

Especially note the way the road on the right side of the pic runs _right_ up
to the dropoff, well past the last carport entrance, with sidewalk and road
markings all the way. They're selling the image of a chunk of suburbia sliced
out and airlifted into the city.

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ahmedfromtunis
Is this for lease or can people buy these houses? If they do buy them, what
does that even mean? Do they own the land? And what happens if the mall people
decide that it is no longer profitable?

I mean, I __really __love the idea to live there, but there are so many
questions that the article didn 't answer!

~~~
marapuru
From what I know most houses in Indonesia can be bought without actually
owning the land. So I doubt they own the land on these houses.

Next to that, there is a huge leasing and lending market in Indonesia. So I
would guess that these houses are bought with a mortgage but they don't own
the land.

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sksksk
There used to be similar housing above the arndale shopping centre (which got
removed after the bombing in 96)

[https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-
manchester-13378696](https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-
manchester-13378696)

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jonballant
This was quiet interesting to hear the reactions of locals who live in cosmo
park. An interesting concept.

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codeisawesome
Wow this is so cool, looks like something from Altered Carbon or some sci-fi
video game!

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aaron695
Not cheap, for the rich - [https://www.jakarta-
apartment.net/category/apartment/cosmo-p...](https://www.jakarta-
apartment.net/category/apartment/cosmo-park/)

Don't know why the article has no pics with cars in it since all the
townhouses have car parks.

Interesting to know what the PM 2.5 is.

~~~
veidr
PM 2.5 is particulate matter (in the air) with diameter of less than 2.5
micrometers. I only know this because the Tokyo weather reports on TV include
the PM 2.5 forecast for tomorrow as well (it seems to mostly blow over from
China, although there must be domestic sources as well).

Very heavy PM 2.5 can cause disruptions like schoolkids being kept indoors...
from this, I've deduced it is probably harmful to health, or at least presumed
to be so.

Finally, masks that can filter out PM 2.5 can be easily purchased from
webstores, but none of them are comfortable to ride a bicycle or walk around
all day in.

Now you know as much as I do. :)

~~~
veidr
Oh what _the_ PM 2.5 is, right, lol. Well I will leave my answer for the other
guy who hadn't heard of PM 2.5.

As for the PM 2.5 level in Jakarta, well... not... so good...

[https://aqicn.org/city/jakarta/](https://aqicn.org/city/jakarta/)

