Transport sector regulatory agencies will now operate under one entity for efficient coordination, Governor Johnson Sakaja has said.
Sakaja said entities like NTSA, Nairobi Metropolitan Area Transport Authority, Kenya Railways, Kura and KeNHA have been operating in silos, making their work disjointed and at sometimes, conflicting.
He said residents have been paying the price for the lack of seamlessness through traffic snarl-ups and delays.
Last week, the governor met key authorities from the entities to synergise their responsibilities to ensure they operate under one roof.
He said a new transport and safety committee will have a representation from the bodies to address issues of mobility and traffic management.
“Various agencies dealing with transport and traffic management have been operating in silos within Nairobi,” Sakaja said after the meeting.
“We’ve brought together NAMATA, NTSA, KR, Kura and KeNHA under the Nairobi county transport and safety committee to streamline mobility and traffic management.”
NAMATA’s responsibility is to improve the public transport system in Nairobi Metropolitan Area through the introduction and implementation of the Mass Rapid Transit System.
The MRTS system comprises Bus Rapid Transit System, Commuter Rail System and a Non-Motorised Transport System.
NTSA deals with motor licensing while Kura deals with bettering roads in urban centres.
KeNHA manages the highways and trunk roads passing through the city while Kenya Railways is engaged in managing the rail tracks and commuter trains in the city.
Last month, Sakaja unveiled a Sh16 billion plan involving Kura, to ease traffic congestion.
He said he would oversee the development of a tech-based solution to ensure efficient traffic management by seamlessly integrating human and tech components for better mobility.
The plan envisions establishing an intelligent transport management centre to be situated along Mombasa Road near City Cabanas.
“We want to deploy smart technology to ensure order in our transport sector, It makes no sense to have working traffic lights yet the movement of vehicles is still manually controlled,” Sakaja said.
The project will be funded by the South Korean government.
The centre will sit on a 10-hectare piece of land and will incorporate the use of traffic cameras and sensors to ease traffic congestion.
It will synchronise data to provide uniform data at 100 new junctions in addition to the existing traffic lights.
Edited by Kiilu Damaris
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