Uhuru should focus on this expressway - kind of legacy defining stuff

[RV Pundit]

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https://www.standardmedia.co.ke/explainers/article/2001386584/how-the-expressway-will-affect-property-owners-along-its-path

[RV Kirgit]

I think it's another white elephant like SGR to bush

[RV Pundit]

Could be - because 70B - the chinese hope to recoup through toll station is a tall order. But it's ground breaking. The first toll station road. If it works - we can tap into lots of such project to build malaba-mombasa superhighway - which is long overdue.

I was talking to this old mzungu engineer one day in Jinja - moved there to build jinja hydro plant in 1950s - and he told me mwafrika ni bure sana - because in old days he use to drive from Jinja to Nairobi in few hours - now 50yrs - population has increased nearly 10 times - and road is still the same - cars has increased 10 times - and now the gridlock mean you drive the whole day - if you have the it in you.

I think it's another white elephant like SGR to bush

[Arcadian_Dreamer]

The construction of pedestrian walkways and cycling lanes will be his legacy. It will have a major impact because majority of Kenyans don't own vehicles, catering only to those who have motorized vehicles to them at the expense of the vast majority who don't is undemocratic. Nairobi and other urban areas in Kenya should borrow a leaf from Bogota and prioritize non motorized modes of transport.

[RV Pundit]

Is anybody doing that beyond Nairobi Old Mzungu CBD. Yes Nairobi need walkways - majority of people walk to work - for economic reasons - and also for traffic jams. But I doubt they are doing this beyond CBD - it a low hanging fruit -  cycling will not work though - city is too chaotic - people don't obey rules - it's dangerous to cycle in Nairobi.

And these are little projects for counties - so Uhuru should really focus on big fish.

Nairobi has serious water shortage probel - Northern Collector - is band aid - Nairobi need to find another dam the size of Ndakaini that Moi built.

Nairobi has serious traffic jam - Railway modernization is all good - but we need to give Chinese serious money to build a modern metro line - otherwise those NYS will only improve the rickety train by some factor - but a railway line that can carry 1M daily - requires serious investment.

The construction of pedestrian walkways and cycling lanes will be his legacy. It will have a major impact because majority of Kenyans don't own vehicles, catering only to those who have motorized vehicles to them at the expense of the vast majority who don't is undemocratic. Nairobi and other urban areas in Kenya should borrow a leaf from Bogota and prioritize non motorized modes of transport.

[Arcadian_Dreamer]

Is anybody doing that beyond Nairobi Old Mzungu CBD. Yes Nairobi need walkways - majority of people walk to work - for economic reasons - and also for traffic jams. But I doubt they are doing this beyond CBD - it a low hanging fruit -  cycling will not work though - city is too chaotic - people don't obey rules - it's dangerous to cycle in Nairobi.

And these are little projects for counties - so Uhuru should really focus on big fish.

Nairobi has serious water shortage probel - Northern Collector - is band aid - Nairobi need to find another dam the size of Ndakaini that Moi built.

Nairobi has serious traffic jam - Railway modernization is all good - but we need to give Chinese serious money to build a modern metro line - otherwise those NYS will only improve the rickety train by some factor - but a railway line that can carry 1M daily - requires serious investment.

We can't even repay SGR white elephant. Be serious.

Railways won't solve our last mile ridership issue. Railways will take you to one central terminus, you still need another mode to take your to your destination. If you going to have a mass rapid transit, the cheapest option is the bus rapid transit model of Curitiba, Brazil and the one being implemented in Dar es Salam, TZ. 

Cycling is a low hanging fruit. Build cycling lanes all around the city, mandate every road contractor to build both pedestrian and cycling lane from now on. Should be dirt cheap but a huge bang for the buck -- in terms of environmental benefits, road construction savings due to less motorized traffic on the roads, savings on fuel which we import draining our foreign exchange, health savings, more money in the pockets for the ordinary people instead of Japanese conglomerates. The impact will be transformational. Then those nasty matatus will disappear from the picture gradually.

This project utility then is to serve as template for the rest of urban Kenya to show that you don't have to follow the "failed western transportation model" where car ownership, and expensive public projects in the name of transportation are mandated.

Chinese built boondoggles are not the answer to our transportation woes, they only undermine our fiscal solvency and threat to our national sovereignty.

[Arcadian_Dreamer]

The is the ideal city street layout we should be emulating. We can't keep building city streets as if only automobile owners matter. We should cater to all residents equally.

[RV Pundit]

Nairobi is a big city heading to 10m people soon if you include the metropolis.You cannot apply lipstick to it.Nairobi need very serious investment on its roads,railway, water sanitation and housing.We are talking more than  20B dollars in deficit..housing alone you need nearly 1 million units to house 2million living in slums..that alone require 10b dollars..water and sewage maybe another 5b dollars..Railway and metro...maybe 5b dollars..roads need to be seriously expanded..and within metro paved..10b dollars.That is Nairobi metro alone.Railway and housing can easily funded by private sector like it's done on energy or electricity and  the Nairobi Expressway is one such example

[Arcadian_Dreamer]

Nairobi is a big city heading to 10m people soon if you include the metropolis.You cannot apply lipstick to it.Nairobi need very serious investment on its roads,railway, water sanitation and housing.We are talking more than  20B dollars in deficit..housing alone you need nearly 1 million units to house 2million living in slums..that alone require 10b dollars..water and sewage maybe another 5b dollars..Railway and metro...maybe 5b dollars..roads need to be seriously expanded..and within metro paved..10b dollars.That is Nairobi metro alone.Railway and housing can easily funded by private sector like it's done on energy or electricity and  the Nairobi Expressway is one such example

It should be broken up.

[RV Pundit]

How will that help - you cannot apply a lipstick to pig like Nairobi. The existing roads are tiny, the railway rickety, the water not enough, sanitization poor and affordable housing non-existent. That is infrastructure. Now when you come to easy stuff - like public transport - matatus, motorcycles - those are software issues - change of policy - not really investment are needed there.

What Nairobi and Kenya need is 100B dollars worth of investment to bridge it's infrastructure deficit.

Where do we get that money - from loans - or from private sector like this 70B kshs that chinese are investing and hoping to recoup - or from selling some gov assets - like Safaricom.

100B is not a lot of money - and it's doable - if we invest 10B annually - we can bridge the divide in 10yrs - if we do 20B - we can do it in 5yrs.

The development we need is simple - medium term - next 15yrs.

1) Expand our paved road network from 20,000kms to something like 100,000kms. Our total road network is now 200,000 - with classified about 100K. We know the average cost per Km is close to 200K dollars per KM for low seal volume - and 1M dollars for highways- if you eliminate corruption. So you need 20-50B dollars.

2) Expand our railway network from rickety 2,000kms to something like 20,000kms - we know average cost is nearly 5M dollars per km if you eliminate corruption - so this could cost us 100B dollars - and this being expensive - we have to scale down.

3) Expand water and irrigation - nearly every county need about 300m dollars to build a dam and pipping for this. That is another 15B dollars.

4) Expand housing and related - this one can be driven by private sector if gov nails a few software issues - but generally we have 12M household - and the housing deficit is about 2M - mostly in urban areas.

Once you do that - kenya will move to a middle class country - like South Africa.

To move from South Africa to developed nation is where lipstick is now applied - bicycle lanes - traffic lights - kind of thing.

It should be broken up.

[gout]

Transport into such a tiny CBD is lost cause; since not possible to convince people and more so elites to leave my cars out of TINY CBD. Or ar we going to demolish Hilton for the Metro?
 
There is serious water and sewer projects in action for Nairobi. The demolitions were a part of it to unlock AfDB funding.
https://www.standardmedia.co.ke/nairobi/article/2001369284/state-reveals-more-grabbed-nairobi-land-after-ruai-sewer-saga

Karimenu Dam is on

Several treatment plants, pipelines and 5 million Water tank in Embakasi.

Storm water drainage is ongoing for Kahawa, Ruiru and Githurai.

North Colector Tunnels were supposed to be over but they keep pushing the dealines.

Water sector is where Uhuru ought to test his beloved military men. Not sure how Sicily will fair here - can she actualize Karua's water visions.

[RV Pundit]

Sorry the water is not enough for Nairobi city - leave alone Nairobi metro - housing 2m of kenya - surviving on borehole water. We need very serious investment. Nairobi Water should be taken back by gov.

I think Karua reforms failed. She spawned so many water boards and privatized the water companies - but nothing much has come out of it. It's been 15yrs - Total Epic Failure.

You don't privatize water. It never has no profit margins to finance capital expenditure - heck majority cannot even meet their opex.

We need to do away with Karua water reforms - and return back water to kenya Gov - so it can be funded and capitilzed heavily.

Apart from a few gravity water projects - the rest cannot even meet operational costs.

The solution - disband all these water bodies - and return back the Kenya gov.

Otherwise right now we depend on the benevolence of World Bank - like we do for health sector - for water and sanitation projects.

Transport into such a tiny CBD is lost cause; since not possible to convince people and more so elites to leave my cars out of TINY CBD. Or ar we going to demolish Hilton for the Metro?
 
There is serious water and sewer projects in action for Nairobi. The demolitions were a part of it to unlock AfDB funding.
https://www.standardmedia.co.ke/nairobi/article/2001369284/state-reveals-more-grabbed-nairobi-land-after-ruai-sewer-saga

Karimenu Dam is on

Several treatment plants, pipelines and 5 million Water tank in Embakasi.

Storm water drainage is ongoing for Kahawa, Ruiru and Githurai.

North Colector Tunnels were supposed to be over but they keep pushing the dealines.

Water sector is where Uhuru ought to test his beloved military men. Not sure how Sicily will fair here - can she actualize Karua's water visions.

[gout]

Karua's reforms are working. Athi Waters does the infrastructure and Karua reforms water companies takes care of the daily operations and simple maintenances. Just that some Water Companies are politicised - Murangá and Nairobi where governors felt challenges, other areas they are working well. The water companies were supposed to be independent PTAs or School Boards before interference by Ministry -sort of community oversight management.

In a way, Karua reforms have helped manage the North Collector politics by having Muwasco checking Wa Iria. This has in no way stopped the billions into the NCT.

Water sector reforms have over the years been corrupted to become cash cows via exaggerated costing and ghost projects instead of freeing the nation from hunger #TurkanaDrought

— Martha Karua SC (@MarthaKarua) March 19, 2019

We can devolve services to counties and even such boards.

The corruption led development is what has inflated cost of doing simple projects and making them unamanageable. Nairobi City Council cofinanced the Ndakaini dam, tunneling, Ngethu treatment, piping and reservoirs with a 2 billion grant while these tunnels are at 30 billions so far.

NCC's part of thepayments were revised from the Kshs. 248,744,781.90 million (US $4.15 million) atthe start of the contract to Kshs. 578 million (US $9.6 million) as at the last certification

https://www.researchgate.net/publication/260096110_The_problems_of_project_implementation_a_post-mortem_study_of_Thika_Dam_project_Kenya
The counties just require guarantees but Uhuru would rather create parallel Metropolitan Services.

We have to get clear limits of the govt.

Too much govt in transport has failed. Govt thinking of running buses is stupid. NYS buses are grounded. Matatus for me do quite a good job- maybe regulations as seen in Covid where their carrying capacity is now 2/3. With a redesign of standalone seats,. this would make it somewhta difficult to carry excess passengers.

Another Central Govt corrption led maendeleo: The SGR for Ngong and Rongai has proved too expensive - boda boda to station 100, fare 100 then if coming to CBD from syokimau board another train to CBD??

[Arcadian_Dreamer]

Sorry the water is not enough for Nairobi city - leave alone Nairobi metro - housing 2m of kenya - surviving on borehole water. We need very serious investment. Nairobi Water should be taken back by gov.

I think Karua reforms failed. She spawned so many water boards and privatized the water companies - but nothing much has come out of it. It's been 15yrs - Total Epic Failure.

You don't privatize water. It never has no profit margins to finance capital expenditure - heck majority cannot even meet their opex.

We need to do away with Karua water reforms - and return back water to kenya Gov - so it can be funded and capitilzed heavily.

Apart from a few gravity water projects - the rest cannot even meet operational costs.

The solution - disband all these water bodies - and return back the Kenya gov.

Otherwise right now we depend on the benevolence of World Bank - like we do for health sector - for water and sanitation projects.

You are a big government fan. Why were you denying it a few days back?

Water privatization has been a boon for citizens. There is no going back. Water as a precious resource has to be priced.

Eti disband these water bodies. Sheer madness.

[RV Pundit]

Under investment ( less thievery) has meant every Nairobi resident has to stock water in cherry can.
Ndakaini was done by French gov in 1990s - just imagine that.
Nairobi has grown maybe 5 times more in terms of the number of people.

I rather someone eat 10% like Uhuru did but give us SGR.

We need MEGA investment in water project.

Yes someone somewhere will get 10% - and become a billionaire - but every Nairobi resident will be up there.

Otherwise what surely is Northern collector and all these Kamikaze projects when Nairobi Metro requires maybe 2 Ndakainis.

As for software issues - Matatu versus NYs - kind of thing - that is small talk.

Karua's reforms are working. Athi Waters does the infrastructure and Karua reforms water companies takes care of the daily operations and simple maintenances. Just that some Water Companies are politicised - Murangá and Nairobi where governors felt challenges, other areas they are working well. The water companies were supposed to be independent PTAs or School Boards before interference by Ministry -sort of community oversight management.

In a way, Karua reforms have helped manage the North Collector politics by having Muwasco checking Wa Iria. This has in no way stopped the billions into the NCT.

Water sector reforms have over the years been corrupted to become cash cows via exaggerated costing and ghost projects instead of freeing the nation from hunger #TurkanaDrought

— Martha Karua SC (@MarthaKarua) March 19, 2019

We can devolve services to counties and even such boards.

The corruption led development is what has inflated cost of doing simple projects and making them unamanageable. Nairobi City Council cofinanced the Ndakaini dam, tunneling, Ngethu treatment, piping and reservoirs with a 2 billion grant while these tunnels are at 30 billions so far.

NCC's part of thepayments were revised from the Kshs. 248,744,781.90 million (US $4.15 million) atthe start of the contract to Kshs. 578 million (US $9.6 million) as at the last certification

https://www.researchgate.net/publication/260096110_The_problems_of_project_implementation_a_post-mortem_study_of_Thika_Dam_project_Kenya
The counties just require guarantees but Uhuru would rather create parallel Metropolitan Services.

We have to get clear limits of the govt.

Too much govt in transport has failed. Govt thinking of running buses is stupid. NYS buses are grounded. Matatus for me do quite a good job- maybe regulations as seen in Covid where their carrying capacity is now 2/3. With a redesign of standalone seats,. this would make it somewhta difficult to carry excess passengers.

Another Central Govt corrption led maendeleo: The SGR for Ngong and Rongai has proved too expensive - boda boda to station 100, fare 100 then if coming to CBD from syokimau board another train to CBD??

[RV Pundit]

Private sector has limited capacity and zero stomach for risks in such huge public enterprises.
We also cannot allow private sector to charge market rate for water - otherwise Kibera people will not get any water.
There are things that private sector should not really be in - Roads, Railway, Water, some part of electricity.

Nairobi metro has now close to 7m people.
The water it needs is easy to find.
7M times average water per person per day (80-100L).

That is close to 700M litres of water daily - and with distribution loses along the pipe work - just use 1 billion litres.

Ndakaini is doing 400M litres per day.

That leave a deficit of 600M litres per day.

Now look at all the little projects by Gout Athi River.

Northern collector will add another 140M per day.

We still have a deficit close to 500M litres per day.

So you can go round like Sonko with cameras dismanting water cartels - or dig as many boreholes as you like - but BOSS 500M litres per day is REQUIRED.

That is another NDAKAINI DAM.

Who in the private sector will finance such?

And we are talking now - few more years - Nairobi Metro - will require 2B litres - meaning 4 Ndakaini dams.

The solution is easy - WE NEED MEGA DAM - THAT MEAN CHINESE or FRENCH - come in - take 1B dollars - some politician takes 10B kshs - and everyone get water.

That 10% - is consultancy as murathe say - for taking around chinese and for making sure the project never get delayed.

It's what KPMG or PWC would charge anyway as project management.

Let's not miss water because we are afraid of mega projects..


Some as intelligent as Ruto understand this kind of easy maths. Most of you with your low IQ will never get it.

Can little Athi River Water company sign 1 billion dollar project. Nope. They have no capacity for such.

Karua made them little bodies all over...that cannot do anything serious...just waiting for World Bank to send them grants.

You are a big government fan. Why were you denying it a few days back?

Water privatization has been a boon for citizens. There is no going back. Water as a precious resource has to be priced.

Eti disband these water bodies. Sheer madness.

[gout]

What intelligence does it take for broke and amorphous KR managing $3B dollars SGR?

We have witnessed Uhuru pump nearly $.35 billion to an armorphous NMS on a wake and go basis.

Some as intelligent as Ruto understand this kind of easy maths. Most of you with your low IQ will never get it.

Can little Athi River Water company sign 1 billion dollar project. Nope. They have no capacity for such.

Karua made them little bodies all over...that cannot do anything serious...just waiting for World Bank to send them grants.

[RV Pundit]

Well KPA had to sign a take or leave - and I suspect Chinese are behind the move to amalgmate all of them. KPA have money - so maybe Chinese are targetting that - for loan repayment.

What intelligence does it take for broke and amorphous KR managing $3B dollars SGR?

We have witnessed Uhuru pump nearly $.35 billion to an armorphous NMS on a wake and go basis.

Some as intelligent as Ruto understand this kind of easy maths. Most of you with your low IQ will never get it.

Can little Athi River Water company sign 1 billion dollar project. Nope. They have no capacity for such.

Karua made them little bodies all over...that cannot do anything serious...just waiting for World Bank to send them grants.

[KenyanPlato]

Pundit is over obsssessed in leap froging using infrastructure development as the spring board. It is not gonna happen a $80 billion economy has no way of financing $200 billion.. what kenya needs to understand is until we grow the economy there won't be those infrastructure development.. may be if we discovered oil and Gas we can use that wealth to invest in infrastructure..

South Africa without the mineral wealth would be just another Kenya and it will soon become another Kenya

[RV Pundit]

So what do you suggest we do. Why stress the current generation for projects that will last 50-100yrs?

Ndakainin was built in 1990 - and it will provide water for maybe 200yrs - before we rehabiltate the dam.

Why borrow short-term to finance long term projects?

 I think 200B dollars is easy money in global debt markets.

Austria just floated another century bond

https://www.ft.com/content/d556879f-7b4f-48e5-9b73-d29314c17151

And if we cannot get money - let sell all these jewels like Safaricom - get 20B dollars - and borrow another 30B - that is 50B dollars enough to finance the country.

We can even sell some islands and Nairobi National Park for sure.

Pundit is over obsssessed in leap froging using infrastructure development as the spring board. It is not gonna happen a $80 billion economy has no way of financing $200 billion.. what kenya needs to understand is until we grow the economy there won't be those infrastructure development.. may be if we discovered oil and Gas we can use that wealth to invest in infrastructure..

South Africa without the mineral wealth would be just another Kenya and it will soon become another Kenya