BY BUSINESS DAILY: The property of chairman of Trapos Group, the firm promoting the multibillion-shilling Likoni cable cars project to ease traffic at the Likoni channel in Mombasa, is facing the auctioneer’s hammer.
Dr Eustace Mwarania’s developed residential property in Karen, Nairobi, is set for auction on October 16, according to a notice published in Monday’s dailies. The development is a five-bedroom, double storey house and sits on a 0.95 acre parcel whose 99-year lease will expire in 2077, the auctioneers said.
Others developments on the multimillion-shilling property include domestic quarters, offices, a farm house, two donkey kennels and ablution block, the notice read.
“(We will auction) all that parcel of land known as LR No. 1160/968 (IR No. 84262) Kwarara Road-Karen, Nairobi registered in the name of Eustace Kaburu Mwarania g/t Trapos Ltd,” read the notice.
Although the auctioneers did not disclose the reserve price of the property, an acre in Karen ranged between Sh. 52.8 and Sh. 65 million in June, according to HassConsult, which monitors land prices based on advertised prices.
That means the property’s value is more than Sh. 100 million given the developments therein. Dr Mwarania founded Trapos, a Nairobi-based aerial transit solutions development firm, in 2012.
The firm has since 2015 been promoting the idea of erecting cableways in Nairobi and Mombasa to ease the growing pains of traffic snarl-ups in Kenya’s two largest cities.
Trapos last December signed a consultancy deal with state-owned Kenya Ferry Services (KFS) for the proposed Sh. 4.1 billion cable car services at Likoni channel, which connects Mombasa island with the mainland.
The express link, which will have 22 cable cars with a capacity of 38 passengers each, being implemented under public-private partnership framework, is expected to carry about 180,000 passengers at a higher speed on completion. This is expected to ease pressure on ferries, which carry about 300,000 people and 6,000 vehicles daily.
Environment-friendly cable cars propelled by steel cables, use aerial technology rather than ground infrastructure such as bitumen-standard road.
The Likoni cable car system, which received the green light from the Cabinet last month, is set to be constructed by C&C Construction Company and Austrian technology company, Doppelmayr Group, in two years as per initial plan.
