The government’s efforts to decongest the city from the nauseating traffic jams experienced every day is becoming more chaotic once again, proving that there is a serious deficit of thinkers and problem solvers in its ranks.
It started with the painting of the Bus Rapid Transit lane along Thika Superhighway whose paint has since faded. Secondly, the government made plans to import 32 high-capacity buses from South Africa.
And now, there are plans to build a bus lane along the same superhighway to be used by the BRT buses. Meanwhile, the company to run the mass transit is yet to be formed!
This is the true definition of the theatre of the absurd. Projects ought to be done logically and systematically but the government seems to have a ridiculous idea.
It plans to spend around Sh5.8 billion on the project, yet adding more buses on the already congested roads will worsen the traffic nightmare.
It amazes me that ideas for elevated (aerial) light rail system, like monorails, is never an alternative here.
The same amount the government plans to spend on the bus lane might be sufficient to put up a monorail system from Ruiru Town to Nairobi’s city centre with the potential of transporting hundreds of thousands of passengers per day.
Unfortunately, our bureaucratic government system doesn’t allow for innovativeness and dynamic thinking because of conflict of interest. Somebody somewhere is selfishly benefiting from all this.
We need a major shift on how we think about the future of our cities and mass transit systems in terms of sustainability, efficiency, safety, comfort and cost.
Antony Alex Irungu, Nairobi
In a stroke of ingenuity, Upperhill traffic will soon be linked to Mbagathi Road via Hospital Road, but the shortcut may end up transferring City Mortuary/Nairobi Hospital gridlocks downstream!
To address both the Mbagathi/Wilson Airport and City Mortuary snarl-ups, traffic should overpass both Mbagathi Road/Nairobi Dam and connect directly to Southern Bypass or further on at the Galleria interchange (assuming Lang’ata Road will be dualled soon).
For the umpteenth time, somebody please link Southern Bypass to Syokimau. Alternatively, open up the privatised public roads within the SGR complex.
Some Eastleigh matatus operate from outside the Old Nation House and neighbouring buildings on Tom Mboya Street.
When the turn for a matatu comes to move forward and occupy an empty slot, it spews a thick cloud of black smoke and that runs into the premises on the ground floor.
This is no doubt a health hazard and I believe many business owners and workers at the premises keep on having an infection in their throats.
What can be done to curb the emission of such smoke? I once heard that there is a mechanism that can check this. Please act.
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