The National Physical Planning Board Chairperson, Amanda Ngabirano revealed they are working with government to streamline public transport. “We have already prepared a paper regarding this, we are not going not run the city, especially Greater Kampala metropolitan using the smaller carrying vehicles, and those plans are there. What is lacking are the vehicles and infrastructure,” she said
This was during the Greater Kampala metropolitan area workshop on physical planning on Wednesday. Ngabirano said they are only missing the right vehicles and infrastructure to implement the plans. “Money allocated to local government physical planning is embarrassing and too small to make visual change,” she revealed
“We need higher carrying capacity vehicles to complement the 14 seaters, have bicycle lanes for short distances and that is a every efficient mode of transport, also healthy and environmentally friendly. People can commute for up to 5-7 kilometers on a bicycle and that’s already one car off the road.” she stated
Ngabirano maintains that the 14 seater matatus will still be need to do feeder routes but should stay outside of the City center.
According to Kampala Capital City Authority (KCCA) physical planner, Abel Opolot said the economy loses over UGX 500 million to traffic jam. “Traffic jam is the biggest challenge in the city because the time people lose to their places of work is massive and [there is] degradation of infrastructure when vehicles are stuck in jam, it means even the roads are affected,” he said
“’If you calculated how much we lose in jam for a year, the money would be adequate to fund this country’s budget because we have the early morning and evening rush hours, and when you combine the two, it compounds the problem. We are losing resources that would have been used to spike economic growth.” he added
Opolot said the traffic jam catastrophe can be solved by constructing by-pass roads, eliminating motorcycle taxis and encouraging the public to use environmental friendly means of transport such as bicycles and walking.
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