KENYA: Traffic congestion in Nairobi is costing business millions of shillings in fuel consumption, car damage and time wasted on the road

Once known as East Africa's green "City in the Sun", Nairobi is so choked with traffic that Kenya's architects suggest moving to a new capital and angry business leaders say the booming economy is under threat. A combination of bad drivers, ramshackle vehicles, overloaded trucks, potholed roads and corrupt traffic police make one of Africa's biggest cities resemble the dodgems on a good day and, when things get really bad, reduce it to gridlock. Swarming minibuses, known as matatus, are the only option for most Nairobi commuters, but they are notorious for their drivers' kamikaze tactics and their crumbling mechanical condition, which often means no lights at night. Matatus, weaving wildly from lane to lane, account for 80 percent of public transport and are a major cause of congestion. "Cars are increasing at a rate of I think half a million per year in Nairobi. And now if that is now left to continue, then it will come a time when it will be impossible to operate in Nairobi. And of course that will shy away investors because nobody will want to come and spend all their time on the road, more time on the road than in their offices," said Chairman, Architectural Association of Kenya Mr. Gideon Mulyungi. Fatal crashes are common. The Sunday Nation newspaper called a recent spate of matatu accidents a "national slaughter." Kenya's crumbling roads and the chaotic traffic have become a political issue ahead of elections in December, denting the popularity of President Mwai Kibaki. A recent survey said traffic jams were costing Nairobi drivers up to 50 million shillings (746,000 US dollars) a day through increased fuel consumption, mechanical damage and pollution. "First, what should be done to reduce the traffic jam is the removal of the roundabouts. Fly overs should be introduced for the vehicles heading town, and also for others leaving the town," said Moses Wanyoike, a matatu driver. The Architectural Association of Kenya (AAK) last month asked the government to move the capital elsewhere. "We are now talking about three and a half million people living in Nairobi, and considering that the city was designed for only half a million people. So the capacity of the city is overstretched beyond its limits and that is why you see overcrowding all over," added AAK chairman Gideon Mulyungi. City traffic is worst on Friday evenings, especially near pay day. When rain turns the potholes into ponds, there is chaos. The jams are regularly compounded by a string of accidents and breakdowns, many involving ancient trucks which have a tendency to roll backwards down Nairobi's many hills. Nairobi's traffic lights are largely ignored. The police, known for being more interested in bribes from harassed motorists than untangling the jams, often overrule the lights anyway and their efforts can make the hold-ups worse. Yet experts, including Japanese road engineers who did a two-year study, say Nairobi's problems are not insurmountable and nothing like as complex as some cities. While traffic has expanded -- some estimates say by 300 percent in a decade -- the roads have not. "What I think about congestion, they should keep the matatus in order, organize places for taxis and personal vehicles," said Purity Njeri, a resident of Nairobi. There is only one road, the Uhuru Highway, running right through the city and it is punctuated by a string of roundabouts acting as anarchic traffic traps. The highway is used not only by most commuters but also by heavy trucks transiting to all parts of the country, including from the port of Mombasa to Uganda and central Africa. Plans to overcome Nairobi's congestion bypasses, overpasses and 14 "missing links" to avoid long detours began 30 years ago. Nothing was done. The reason, say experts, was systematic corruption during the 24-year rule of former President Daniel Arap Moi, who was replaced in 2002 by Kibaki. For the decade after 1994, foreign donor funding, essential for building new roads, dried up because of the huge graft. By the end of the Moi era only 20 percent of the country's roads were in adequate condition. It is taking years to overcome the backlog. Even now, five years later, about 57 per cent of the network is in poor shape, while the booming economy puts even more cars on the road. Big donor countries privately express frustration that the comprehensive 2006 Japanese plan for solving Nairobi's road and traffic problems has still not been implemented. In April, President Kibaki announced plans for a 2 billion Kenyan shilling (30 million US dollars) Chinese project to widen the Uhuru Highway and link it to the west of the city. But some Western donors complain this is not co-ordinated with the Japanese plan and many people remain sceptical at the pace of change.

ITN Source | November 14, 2007

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