The Engineering Institution of Zambia has proposed a number of measures to addressing road traffic congestion in Zambia.
Engineers who gathered at a public discussion in Lusaka Thursday evening on road traffic congestion said there is an urgent need to address the situation.
The panelists drawn from the Engineering Institution of Zambia, Lusaka City Council, Roads Development Agency, National Road Fund Agency and the Ministry of Transport and Communications all agreed that Lusaka needs a new transport management system.
Engineering Institution of Zambia Vice President George Sitali said there is need to make bold statements that all the institutions mandated to manage the road system in Lusaka have failed the city.
“We need to be bold here and make bold statements. The first statement is that our city was badly planned. The way the roads are designed in this city does not match up with the way traffic is flowing, so you need to tie traffic flow and your road network which has affected our own intervention on our roads, Just imagine me wearing this shirt every day for the rest of this year, what is going to happen to my shirt? There will be wear and tear on the shirt,” Mr Sitali said.
Lusaka City Council Director of Engineering Gilbert Nsendama stated that the traffic situation is further worsened by the disorganized public transport service.
He called for the regulation of mini buses under the Markets and Bus Stations Act in order to bring sanity to public transport.
Mr Nsendama however observed that there is a lot of work going on to decongest Lusaka city roads.
“Works have begun on the L400 and those that have been on Chilimbulu and Burma roads may have seen that the contractor has mobilised and works have started. The L400 will not be the ultimate solution to congestion in Lusaka.
What we should be looking at is an integrated approach and we got that integrated approach through JICA who funded the development of the Integrated Development Plan for Lusaka up to 2030,” Mr Nsendama said.
“A project from that JICA plan has since commenced and this is the inner ring roads,”he said.
He noted that the traffic congestion in Lusaka has been compounded by the fact that most of the roads are radial and end now where.
“We need inner ring roads and integration of other modes of transport, park and ride areas. We also need to think about the social aspects of the solution, the mindset of Lusaka residents has to change because in our society, everybody wants to own a car because it is a sign of wealth.”
Mr Nsendama said Lusaka also needs a mass rapid transport system which will also encompass non-motorized traffic and walk ways.
And Nelson Nyangu Director of Transport at the Ministry of Transport and Communications said the Ministry has a robust plan to modernize Lusaka transport system.
“We are doing L400 and we are creating a four lane along Burma and Chilimbulu roads, we have just completed all the roads under Formula 1 and we are discussing with potential investors to revive Njanji Commuter, as a mass urban transit rail. We wait to make Njanji a ring rail with two tracks which will fly over Lusaka, we are also looking at introducing double decker buses which will move around the ring rail.”
Meanwhile, Road Development Agency Director Mumba Kanyuka noted that Lusaka was designed for very few people.
“Our planning and our forward thinking may have gone out of the window when we were designing the city. As RDA, we do endeavor in designing city roads where we have space and can provide for walk ways and cycle tracks, we provide for them. Some areas you can even find space for drains because they have been built over.”
This should not just be a talk shop to get allowances.This institution ought to be proactive,discouraging people to own vehicles is utter nonsense.Public Transport does not meet any basic safety standards and you are telling me to change my mindset and start using those Deathtraps.Get serious.
The solution is to introduce a 3 hour written paper for one to get a drivers license.
100 marks: 50 marks on common sense on the road.50 technical
We have a lot of riffruffs on our roads.
Stop importation of second hand Japanese vehicles , South africa doesn’t.
Introduce a bus lane.
Here is my proposal you pseudo-engineers
1.Introduce fees for all cars going into town.
2.Push government to introduce a deliberate law that will restrict people from buying condemned second hand cars from Japan
3.If only a njanji commuter can be introduced(which i doubt) it can reduce conjestion by operating between woodlands and town centre and from town centre to Chelston areas.
4.More L400 like projects should be initiated.
5.I doubt the double decker project can work with all those hiace minibuses and other substandard cars still congesting our roads.
Good points. I hope they are reading.
ENGINEERS, YOU ARE NOW TALKING. IN FACT RATHER THAN FLY-OVERS THERE SHOULD BE MORE SPAGHETTI ROADS. BIG BUSES DO NOT ONLY DE CONGEST THE CITIES, BUT ALSO MAKE COMMUTER TRANSPORT SAFE AND ATTRACTIVE FOR THE GENERAL COMMUTING PUBLIC. THEY ARE SIMPLY A COMFORTABLE WAY OF COMMUTING AND ENCOURAGE CITIZENS TO LEAVE THEIR CARS AND JUMP ON PUBLIC TRANSPORT. THEY ALSO CREATE DIRECT AND INDIRECT JOBS.
these chaps are just there to make sitting allowances. we have been with this conjetion for years now, where were they to just wake up from no where? zambian engineers suck..
@matipa ,least they have waken up,its a step in the right direction,the problem lies with politicians who just do things to please the masses without thinking of the future impacts.
Having been to Zambia recently, i think the problem is threefold.
-There is too many unworthy vehicles to be on the road, certainly I would hate to jump in one them seeing Countries such as Japan are dumping these vehicles, There should be a law to deter that.
-The roads are disturbed/affected by having police unnecessary controls, this could be done by the Police sitting by the road and just spot stopping, instead of causing the congestions unnecessary
-Thirdly building of alternative roads, for instance access to the airport is only through one road, perhaps this should filter bigger cars (lorries) at peak hours?
Lastly how about making roads such as Great east road more wider?
Just my thoughts:
Thanks
By the way… How far are we with the famous dual carriage?
ANOTHER SENSELESS TALKSHOW – EIZ Has failed Zambia. Engineers don’t discuss stories but concepts and design options. So, here are my suggestions:
1. A fly-over bridge interchange at the airport round-about enabling straight access to Avondale, Kabulonga, Kamwala and Kafue road FROM THE AIRPORT. 2. Great East and Great North roads to extended to 6 lanes (3 in each direction) with a fly-over bridge interchanges at (a)Lumumba Great north intersection (b) Kabwe round-about and Kafue round-about. 3. Study Church & Independence traffic flow patterns with a view to making one of them a ONE WAY into town and the other ONE WAY OUT of town. 4. A fly-over bridge interchange at Munali round-about with Kamloops enlarged to 4 lanes. 5. Traffic interchange bridges at Addis Ababa & G.East rd
engineers who cant engineer anything as if they all graduated from matero university.
just hear them talking about Lusaka as if its the only place that needs decongestion on the roads.
ba engineer ba nembo imwe
CONTINUED\…
6. We need a 4-lane Highway by pass road from Zani Muone through Matero, Kanyama and Makeni to join Kafue road around Chilanga. 7. Extend to 3 lanes the outlet road to Mumbwa for at least 40km 8. Chongwe-Lusaka portion of G.E road to be 4 lanes
9. Kafue Lusaka should be a 4-lane DUAL CARRIAGE WAY.
10. Lumumba ROAD FROM LILANDA to TOWN should be upgraded to 4 lanes
11. Katimamulilo road should be upgraded to 4 lanes 12. A 4- lane highway from Chilenje to Lilayi and Kafue road 13 Alick Nkhata road from L/Acres to Mutendere should 4 lanes 14. State lodge/new Kasama- Bauleni road should be 4 lanes
15. Kaunda SQ to Munali – 4 lanes 16. ABOLISH MINIBUS STATIONS ALONG MAJOR ROADS e.g. G.East ROAD Likes SA’s Guatrain project a lot of houses need to be demolished & people…
This project is massive and will require some people’s homes to be demolished and compensation pay-outs to be made. south Africa did it with the Gautrain project, and we too can do it.
Feel so chilling even time is way.
You see now that Sata is out of contry, people start to work.
I just hope Sata will not call them useless too.
They are all drunkards. What do they know about city planning? How could it have taken so long to address the ticking time bomb that is Lusaka?
Fly-over bridge,iye mwe bantu,you want to kill people? Call in the chinese
You need roads which will completly by pass lusaka to the copperbelt. The reason being most of the goods imported through southern african countries all have to pass through lusaka to the copperbelt and DRC
Better still mass transit goods should not be by road but by rail. Not on is rail easier to maintain it is not as disruptive as road transport
Pipe dreams !! Even double deckers ? Lol
The solution also lies in PLANNING. Where are the TOWN PLANNERS represented in this forum. They know the cause, as stated in the first statement that lusaka was badly PLANNED, why are they not calling on town planners? Where are the town planners in Zambia? Where is Zambia Instiute of Planners (ZIP)? Some of us in the diaspora can offer advice for free as we have tried to do in PAPERS! Treat the CAUSE of the disease, not the SYMPTOMS!
And the problem is—
PLANNING FAILURE = PF = SATA BUFI!
Solution in my view is to repair the impassable roads that limit the choice for motorists to drive on. We also need to build new roads. RATSA should allow for the the left turn on “RED” light. They could also ban slow moving vehicles at certiain times in the interim.
Absolutely – left turn on red (….many do it already, but should be legal!)
Yes. That filter at the Manda Hill stop lights into Adis Ababa must be commonplace.
This is embarrassing!!
The Engineering institute is holding a conference on how to decongest roads in Lsk? What is wrong with us? – why do we like sitting and talking rather than ACTION. I think an engineer should not be sitting in a workshop to discuss something that even a grade 7 pupil know. We all know that to decongest Lusaka, you need fly over bridges, under ground trains, improved public transport including double decker buses.
The question is HOW and WHEN do we do this? I would think that engineers would have sat down to crack the HOW do we generate funds to design new roads and actually construct them? Theirs should be, What engineering innovations have we come up with that are cost effective, easy to implement fast? Eh!
Shame!!!
I hope Mr Nsendama will read this. Am not sure what the L400 project is about. But temporal measure for de-congesting Chilimbulu and Burma is to make them one way roads i.e. Chilimbulu road coming into town and Burma going towards Woodlands. The small roads between the two roads are already tarred if not mistaken.
I was living in Lusaka before moving to the C/B. Honestly, I don’t think I can ever think of going back to Lsk. This capital city is pathetic in terms of traffic. I am enjoying life here. Ba Lusaka endure it.
Pwekekekeke kuno yalikosa… enjoy CB mwandi
Introduce HOV(heavily occupied vehicle)lanes,this will help buses and cars with more than 2 occupants to use these lanes ,a violators should be heavily fined.Zambia should construct FREE ways,no traffic lights ,no pedestrian crossing except under bridge.one route from chilanga to 10 miles passing far west of Lusaka town and another from great east road to mongu road bypassing Lusaka down town.
It does not need a panel of Engineers to see that you need fly-over roads or the need for say Double deck buses. TALK, TALK TALK all the time. As an interim measure, introduce those Double Deck Buses immediately- provide some incentives for their importation by the private sector. Designate certain roots to be for double decker buses.
meant routes folks
They can talk and talk at the end of the days its the man in statehouse who makes decisions.
Engineers my foot, this country has non. to have a better drainage u need an expatriat al of them check the surrounding of where the stay totaly no positive contribution, a kaponyas surrounding is better than theirs. engineer what ve u ever engineered before? we import even a lazor blade. go to solwezi and see hw they are worsening things, its not yet developed compared to lsk if we had 1 he could control dat dander heads at them hem
Am just wondering why there are only men on that panel, were are female engineers?
We need New Lusaka and need to scrap chilanga…otherwise theres no space to expand. Now city planing is not even there look at the number of ilieagal plots which have to be eventualy be legalised cause pipo have already built on them. to me they a still sleeping!!
Make use of technocrats like those at UNZA, or maybe UNZA has no capacity??? Yaba. Now there i cant even see a proposal just TALK and lables ati ndine Snr Engineer with nothing that u have ever engineered. In Congo a women engineered a Trafic robot… nanga imwe!!
My grand ma would say; “Wasensela ilyo kawa”.
THE SOLUTION IS TO SYSTEMATICALY REMOVE DEPENDENCY ON THE CBD IN THE OLD LUSAKA AND MOVE AWAY.
Poor planning by city planners is the cause of the congestion.What we lack in Zambia is lack of long term planning.Do we have a development plan of up to 50 years for Lusaka or any other Zambian town?
One of the problems of Zambian towns is the idea of converging at one point,ku town.So all traffic in the morning lead to Cairo road or city center.Can we cope?
1) What we actually need is to speed up the concept of malls so that our townships will have malls offering services to the people where they stay and live.
2) Other ways is to build roads around Lusaka so that those going to central,Copperbelt,Northern or Southern province may bypass the city centre.
3) Another method is to charge very high fees for parking in any area around the CBD (Central Business District)
First of all, there is this habit in this country: using too much personal-to-holder and private cars to go to work.
Those of you who have been to Dubai, Japan or South Africa, will agree with me that even people with the best cars in this world do not use them everyday to go for work. In Dubai, the Government has created an extra lane labelled “BUSES ONLY”. If a road has three lanes, one is reserved for nice air-conditioned buses run buy the city council. It is an offense for a private vehicle to use that lane. As we do the L400 or any other project ear-marked to be done, let’s consider this. If the government can introduce good transport (buses), whose tickets are sold electronically (to avoid the scenario currently obtaining at Inter-city terminus) at points of boarding, it will…
Lekeni ukufulungana imwe tu Engineer twansala.Just go and drink your heads off and start boasting of being engineers like what you normally do not amapwete pwete aya mwayamba.
I am surprised. All that brain power and yet, no body is considering providing paying parking spaces.
Even if the journey to place of work become faster due to the expansion of the road network, where the cars are going to be parked?
Without town and country planning’s involvement, these dodgy engineers are doing nothing but jerking off!! They must lift up their heads and eyes and see how other cities are managing urban development.
Zambian roads are narrow, poorly marked, poor night-time markings such as cats-eyes, distances between towns are not in place, even police stations do not have signs off the roads so that new drivers in the location can see where to go for police services. Street lighting is not systematic, instead of embracing solar energy to save on ZESCO for public space lights, these people are in the ancient times.
Lusaka and Zambia are such in a poor state that all is reflected by our brain-dead leaders currently in office!!
Engineers my foot,we don’t have any in this our country.
What do you do youeself?busy getting cheap loans in banks and buying cars to show off in kabwata.
Firstly, ba LT, proof read your articles before posting. Too many spelling errors….
Lets hope this is not just a publicity strategy for EIZ…..
I don’t understand, what the double deck buses will do to help decongest the ‘same’ Lsk road network….??..They may but very insignificant.
What I expect from EIZ is to brain storm and come up with proposals, a draft copy of their ideas and circulate them to the public thru daily papers for us to digest. Then call a public discussion to get a feed back from the general public before selling the idea to the Govt.
For now its like EIZ is just ‘THINKING ALOUD’………just like one top govt official was recently heard ‘thinking aloud’ on how to minimise traffic accident….Thereafter its all quiet…
There is need to consider a combination of solutions. Most engneerings solutions have been well articulated here but there is need to look elsewhere as well.
Firstly, traffic conjection reduces greatly during school holidays. This means there are alot of vehicles taking school children on our roads. What about the Ministry of Education having regulations that compel schools to run school bus services.
Secondly, we could consider varying time for opening business and reporting for work. Currently we all must report at 08:00 hours. We could have all service officers report at 0600 and go home at 1600. Shops etc should maybe open at 0900 and close later than 1700.
You observations are time and can make such a difference, but only problem this does not come with seating allowances and the lucrative deals with the contracts of modern road network. These maneuvers are only because Lusaka City Council is positioning itself for a Euro-bond PF council officials are already having their eyes turn watery at the mere thought of such undertaking.
We just like talkshows, implementation zero. Theoretical Engineers….
…cont’d
When a pressing iron does not heat up, do the basic fault elimination process….
First ensure the power is there, secondly check the fuse before you dismantle to check the element….in the same vain, before we jump to flyover road network, double decker fantasy, we take an aerial view of the existing network, look for filter roads, and where construction of roundabouts will be ideal, Kabwe and Kafue roundabouts may require traffic lights so and so forth
…cont’d
When a pressing iron does not heat up, do the basic fault elimination process….
First ensure the power is there, secondly check the fuse before you dismantle to check the element….in the same vain, before we jump to flyover road network, double decker fantasy, we take an aerial view of the existing network, look for filter roads, and where construction of roundabouts will be ideal, Kabwe and Kafue roundabouts may require traffic lights so and so forth…
Ka brain kobe kalebombako panono! Bambi abantu amano yalipwa,
take for example HAkainde Hichilema Mambala – ongo Bwatabwata che! Big Fyola!
Our engineers are talk of good things to hear. Where is the economy to support all that. Just refer to what PF has done so far and the damage it has done to the confers of the country. We need to start from the source, engineers begin to design products for every day use and be exported so we can have the money to build things we need. Currently we have little industrial base and innovation to drive this economy. PF be serious with agriculture and other productive sectors of the economy so you can generate wealth which will then respond to this type of expenditure. Borrowing will only leave us with infrastructure which will not be useful
Engineers have made a single proposal… busy making unfounded statements! Nowonder we have a poor road network in Zambia. By the way, why wasn’t Kaunda invited?
Awe
Talk,talk,talk so synonimous with Zambia..
Chirwa had a plan. You have all travelled to various countries, you mean you can not implement what you saw. Double deckers will not solve the problem, and who is going to buy and maintain them.
What people never envisaged about Chirwa’s plan is that if he went underground those over bridges would have disappeared and new three lanes created.
Love such debates; will contribute later!!
Stay out of it. We are enjoying the debate without your nuanced opinions
I fear one of the major bottlenecks with Lusaka that is not being addressed is the congestion within the CBD itself. Yes in part this is to do with the through traffic, so the ring road my be a partial solution. One problem is the street side parking!!! Future building construction in the CBD should move towards maximising space in the CBD buy having the car parks in basements (several floors deep!) and not taking up prime land along the roadside. I realise this would require a major overhaul to existing building (they would require stabilisation before you can build car parks under them) but I believe this is part of the long term solution. Otherwise the measure being proposed may improve flow to the city but as soon as we get to the two roundabouts and other exist/entrances then what?!!
Thanks to the organizers of this far-reaching gathering.
My humble contribution is that in the immediate time, the timings of traffic lights need to be responsive to the traffic load at any particular time. A case in point are the settings for the Burma/Nationalist Roads intersection traffic lights, which take too long to change, and of needless to say results in the unnecessary build-up of traffic.
Generally, if the timings were to be reduced, there will be an increase in the flow of the traffic. You may have observed that one does not wait very long to pass the Chilenje/ Chilimbulu Road intersection, simply because the stoppage time is very short (though not controlled by traffic lights).
Wish you all success in this important task
Foolish engineers, stop wasting time with those discussions, as the government to introduce gov to introduce state buses and allocate BUS only lanes so that these ignorant zambians can start leaving these cheap cars home and ride on buses to and frm work, if managers in the UK can use buses who are we not! The problem is that there is too much ubututu in zambia, every one thinks a car is wealth!
The problem is most all you that comment don’t have any vision at all,not even in your households,some people are critical of everything,your wife tells you am pregnant,no,it’s not me,i think it’s Mr so and so,when they ask you for contributions,you still don’t have anything sensible to debate about,what do you want?Are we going to build this country on you stupid criticism?That type of attitude is bad,let those who have something to contribute do so,maybe,just maybe God might answer our prayers one day.
Engineer my foot they only know how to dig copper even shopping mall have to be designed by foreigner and yet we claim to have engineers useless chaps
We need to move away from foreign dependency. Zambians are they only ones that can make an immediate change. We know the roads where made for very few cars and need to change that. The engineers need govt support or all its going to be is just talk. Country does have the money. Just improve the tax revenue collection.
Zambians talk to much! So every Jim and Jack wants to be an expert on roads and city planning now? Let the professionals do their job and do yours.
This is a progressive meeting of engineers that the govt needs to listen to before planning its budget. I like their suggestions
Engineers in Zambia just talk the whole day…the only thing they can engineer is their di*cks…they are so useless, I’d don’t know of any who has designed a machine to even make a razor blade..I can get a grade seven from an American school and he will do better than these chaps at EIZ…
Simple solution our government should just bring American engineers or Japanese engineers they will do a better job expanding roads and constructing flyover bridge roads than our own Zambian engineers who have always failed our nation.
EIZ is the worst engineering institute I have ever heard of. You never hear of them discussing inventions and innovation. Engineers are trained to invent and innovate, any engineer that fails to live to that is incompetent.
At that event in Lusaka, instead of presenting innovative ideas and designs with good analysis on the application of the ideas, they busy listing reasons why there is congestion in Lusaka. And then they present the same old ideas in a basic and simplistic way. What a shame!!!!
Here is a simple interim solution to the congestion in Lusaka. Introduce temporary one way routes between 0700 h and 0900. ie. All lanes on Independence avenue should take town bound traffic from woodlands pick and pay to soweto market. On Church road only one lane leading out of town and the 3 lanes into town. The same on Kabwe rd., great east road and lumuba. Chilimbulu in coming, Burma, outgoing. The flow should then reverse between 4 and 7. Sounds absurd? That’s because I am not an engineer but a problem solver.
Why do people go DownTown ? Offer services like getting a NRC and Passport on the Eastside(Woodlands, Kabulonga or Chilenje). Move Head offices and Intercity terminal away from towncenter.
There are no engineers in Zambia. Look at how narrow is the Kafue round about receiving all vehicles going to libala, chilenge, woodlands and chalala whilst these fake engineers are watching and using the same route. look at the night mare that accompanies the packing space in Lusaka whilst these fake engineers leave their cars on the sides of cairo road and sit in their offices “working” all day.
You *****s condemning engineers are very dull. Some of you have the simplest white collar jobs who contribute nothing but white collar thieving. You think engineers will just wake and start building roads without funds? It is very easy to propose to decongest Lusaka but where is the money? You think engineers will use his money to make dual carriage ways all over Lusaka? Don’t you that we have one of the best engineers but they can’t do anything if there is no money and political will as in previous governments. Don’t you that engineers are doing far much better where they are appreciated and money is available to execute projects.
A person who sits and waits for capital to start a business never starts anything or i they do they never succeed even when capital is given to them free of interest. This is the difference between Galaun Senior and Scott. Both care me to Zambia with nothing but look where their descendants are. An Engineer sitting and waiting for funds or money from heaven? That’s ridiculous. Invent something, man. There is a teacher who has developed the ZAMipad for schools. Thats innovation. 20 Engineers is equivalent to many millions from the banks if they come up with a salable innovation. Don’t just sit and wait for handouts. Do something to solve a problem.
Imwe, ndeke ili kuti kansi? Where’s the Malaysian airplane? Just thinking. Kikikiki
And Tumfweko reported Nigeria s prophet TB Joshua as saying it’s location would be known before the last of last Sunday.
These are just *****s talking nonsense after getting Hugh allowances.
How I hate the Lusaka south-end traffic jams! Now I hear they want to add to this jam by bringing more traffic straight from Chalala to join in. Again, the wider Chilimbulu and Burma roads will bring in a much bigger jam into this same area. Kaya mwe! How I also hate the long winding queues outside one commercial bank in Cairo road! It seems it isn’t only engineers who have traffic challenges.