BRT Buses in Kenya: Kenya has bought the first high capacity buses from South Africa. This is after the government blamed local assemblers over poor body building.
The 64 buses are set to arrive later this month, and will be deployed on the already-marked Thika Super Highway and other major roads within the capital Nairobi.
According to Transport CS James Macharia, priority corridors include Limuru-Kangemi-CBD-Imara Daima –Athi River to Kitengela road. Other motorways identified are Rongai, Bomas-CBD-Ruiru-Thika- Kenol-Murang’a road and Tala-Njiru-Dandora–CBD-Ngong road.
“The fourth line will run from Mama Lucy Hospital-Donholm to the CBD while final line also referred as ‘Nyati’ will start from Ridgeways on Kiambu road to Balozi and end up in Imara Daima,” said Mr Macharia.
At their optimum capacity, the corridors are expected to hold up to 950 high capacity buses, reducing travel time and cost by up to 70 percent, according to the CS. Last November, the Sh. 9.6 billion BRT got a major boost after the EU committed a Sh5 billion grant.
“We are in the process of acquiring the first batch of 64 BRT buses from South Africa. We are yet to establish the total amount of money we will spend on these buses but a BRT bus usually goes for Sh. 25 million,” said Mr Macharia. That would put the total cost of the 64 units at about Sh. 1.6 billion.
