Why it looks like this

In 1619 the Dutch East India Company built Batavia at the mouth of the Ciliwung River: a walled town of canals and gabled houses, deliberately modelled on Amsterdam. The old Kota district still keeps that grid, though most canals were filled after they turned deadly with malaria.

The modern megacity grew inland along its rivers — thirteen of them cross Jakarta — with grand independence-era boulevards like Thamrin-Sudirman cutting through a sea of kampung lanes. Meanwhile, over-pumping of groundwater is sinking north Jakarta by several centimetres a year, one reason Indonesia is building a new capital elsewhere.