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Jakarta (ANTARA News) - Work to construct the Suramadu (Surabaya-Madura) bridge in East Java - which will be the longest one in Indonesia - is now 82 percent completed and expected to be ready for use in March or April 2009, a public works official said.

Costing a total of Rp4.528 trillion, the bridge will be almost 5.5 km long and span a narrow channel between East Java`s provincial capital of Surabaya and Madura island.

The project was now entering a critical phase in which the part being built from the Surabaya side would be joined with the part being set up from the Madura side, Hediyanto Huseini, director of roads and bridges for western Indonesia at the public works ministry, said here.

Speaking about the project`s cost, he said its budget would need an additional 19.84 million US dollars for the building of a museum on the bridge`s construction, monitoring posts and a comprehensive lighting system, he said.

The lighting system was necessary to accentuate the giant bridge as a marine tourist landmark at night time, Huseini said.

After completion, the bridge would be managed like a toll road which the public could use by paying a fee which would be kept as low as possible as the bridge was not an investment but a public facility, he said.

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