Haya...what happened to Kigaboni City?
Africa’s new railways risk going the way of the old ones
Africa’s new railways risk going the way of the old ones
- Thread starter Geza Ulole
- Start date
That's what they always say.
Geza Ulole
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- Oct 31, 2009
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- #23
is on phases and proceeding well!
Nice..
Geza Ulole
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Bridge already + flyover in place starting budget year 2016-2017 another flyover plus 100 km super highway to Chalinze will kick start! Funds already set aside. Housing Real estate projects are planty in that area numerous social security hotels plus conference centers are U/C!
Finally Tz gets a superhighway....after I don't know how many years.
pingli-nywee
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- Sep 16, 2015
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Kwani jubilee wanangoja mtz kama wewe awapigie kura?Ngoja kura yenu sijui ni 2023,CCM wakufanyie maamuzi kama mtoto.
Geza Ulole
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mombasite gabriel
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hehehe..yours 'will be' as usual tz always planning for things that are already present in ke but has construction started for that six lane normal highway(not super)??
Geza Ulole
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mombasite gabriel, thika highway is not 50 km is around 30 km!
Kafrican
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Puffed out
Africa’s new railways risk going the way of the old ones
Jun 4th 2016 | LUBUMBASHI | From the print edition
THE railway station at Lubumbashi, the Democratic Republic of Congo’s second city and the centre of its mining trade, has seen better days. Outside the 1920s Belgian-built whitewashed station, hawkers sell bus tickets south to Zambia and South Africa. Travellers would do much better buying one than going inside—trains in Congo are not for the faint-hearted.
In the ticket hall, standing by a timetable on a blackboard, Baudouin Kalubi, the station master, explains that the next train will depart the following morning to Kindu, about 1,600km (1,000 miles) north. From there passengers can get on buses towards the Congo river. The train is, Mr Kalubi proudly explains, an express, with a new Chinese locomotive. That means it should go at an average speed of 15kph. “It is not the TGV,” he admits, referring to France’s high-speed trains. Yet in Congo there are so few roads that if you can’t afford to fly, the train is all that is left.
Over the past half-century, Africa’s mostly colonial railways have mostly atrophied. According to the International Union of Railways, in 2014 sub-Saharan African trains carried about 158 billion tonne-kilometres of freight, or roughly half of what Australia’s railways carried. Of that, 84% was in South Africa, which has a modern network. Elsewhere, railways that built nations carry a fraction of what they did even in the 1980s.
To remedy this, many African countries are investing vast sums of money—and hope—in new lines. In Kenya a Chinese firm is building one roughly alongside the route of the old track. Another project connects Djibouti’s port to Addis Ababa in Ethiopia. Still more are proposed. Rwanda wants one going through Tanzania; Uganda wants one going to Sudan; others are planned in Nigeria, Guinea and Ghana. Yet there is reason to worry that the new lines will end up much like the old.
The Kenyan project is perhaps the most ambitious. Unlike the old line, which is on a 1,067mm gauge, the new railway is built to a modern “standard gauge” (1,435mm), which ought to increase capacity. Travellers on the ancient British-era passenger trains, which run three times a week from Nairobi to Mombasa, now have their view of the elephants of Tsavo National Park impeded by an enormous embankment for the new line. The idea is that it will carry as much as half of the cargo unloaded at the port of Mombasa, or about ten times as much as the current railway shifts.
Drivers on the main road to the capital ought to cheer if the line results in fewer smoke-spewing trucks coming out of the port, but the business case for it is shaky. The new track is costing Kenya about $4 billion, mostly funded by a loan from the Chinese ExIm bank, but how it will be repaid is unclear.
Although only a year remains before completion, not only are tariffs and rates undecided, but it is not even clear who will run the railway. Kenyan officials have apparently taken to skipping trade conferences of late to avoid answering questions.
Could this be because the new railway is a dud investment? Its fastest trains will do a fairly mediocre 80kph. Much as with the old railway, parts of the new line will be single-track, forcing trains to stop, often for hours, to let others pass. Most absurdly, it is built to a lower standard of load-bearing than most other new freight railways. Some fret it may not be possible to load four full containers onto each wagon, as is done on other new lines. “They’re getting a third-rate railway for the cost of a very expensive one,” says a consultant.
Repaying the loans taken out to build the line will require hefty fees or huge volumes of traffic. But truckers—who now handle more than 95% of the freight moved from Mombasa port—will compete fiercely on price, and shipping companies may look for other ports if levies rise.
Rehabilitating the older line might have cost just 5% as much as building a new one on a new right of way, reckons Pierre Pozzo di Borgo of the International Finance Corporation, part of the World Bank. But efforts to mend rather than buy have generally not gone well either. Since the 1990s many African railways have been handed over to private concessions to boost investment and improve management. But the reality has been disappointing. Competition from truckers (who don’t have to pay their share to maintain roads, even though they do the most damage to them) has shifted cargo from rail to tarmac, shredding the business plans of concessionaires. Many are struggling to cover their running costs, never mind invest.
When the railway that runs from Dakar in Senegal to Mali was first put into private hands, the average age of track was 37 years on the Senegalese side and 51 years on the Malian side. When Tanzania’s network was concessioned in 2001, over half of the network still had the original colonial rails—more than 90 years old. And new lines, too, become old. In the 1970s, in a spirit of socialist co-operation, China built a brand-new line connecting Dar es Salaam, Tanzania’s commercial capital, to Zambia and its copper fields. It has since fallen into disrepair as bad as that of Tanzania’s colonial-era lines. If the latest generation of railways cannot make money either, the temptation then will be to skimp on maintenance.
If only governments were as enthusiastic about maintaining infrastructure as they are about building it. On a continent where almost everything is reused, from mobile-phone parts to plastic bags, governments seem to prefer to buy shiny new things, however expensive.
http://www.economist.com/news/middl...w-railways-risk-going-way-old-ones-puffed-out
MY TAKE
For those Kenyans bragging of SRG, mind u "u r getting a third-rate railway for the cost of a very expensive one,” says a consultant!
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I Would have hoped that you would have noticed that the writter is more about hating everything built by the chinies but I see once again your hate for Kenya has clouded you judgement so much so that you dint see the part where he said your 1970 rail built by chinies is in the same conditions as one built by colonials in 1901
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1970s, in a spirit of socialist co-operation, China built a brand-new line connecting Dar es Salaam, Tanzania’s commercial capital, to Zambia and its copper fields. It has since fallen into disrepair as bad as that of Tanzania’s colonial-era lines. If the latest generation of railways cannot make money either, the temptation then will be to skimp on maintenance.
If only governments were as enthusiastic about maintaining infrastructure as they are about building it. On a continent where almost everything is reused, from mobile-phone parts to plastic bags, governments seem to prefer to buy shiny new things, however expensive.
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So basically the writter is saying, everyone should just stick to the western colonial rail, that instead of replacing it with new Chinese rails signifying that the chinies have taken over and the colonialists are becoming just history with nothing to show for it.
And then. On that part he says.... Much as with the old railway, parts of the new line will be single-track, forcing trains to stop, often for hours, to let others pass. Most absurdly, it is built to a lower standard of load-bearing than most other new freight railways. Some fret it may not be possible to load four full containers onto each wagon, as is done on other new lines.
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He based his whole arguement from an unnamed analyst/'consoltant' that says "MAY" , when big media company start saying "some people say" that 'it may' without qouting sources or their professional capacity......... I know bulshit when I see it....
he just fixed that argument.and then right after that comment he then rightly quotes.... "Rehabilitating the older line might have cost just 5% as much as building a new one on a new right of way, reckons Pierre Pozzo di Borgo of the International Finance Corporation...... he even states his name and the company he works for.... now that a believable accurate statement. .
And FYI, if he had bothered to do his homework, he would have found out that the kenyan rail will be managed by system that will keep track of all trains.... and since on every stage along the SGR, there are 3 tracks, its just a matter of TIMING so that NO TRAIN WILL HAVE TO WAIT FOR THE OTHER. If you have a compurised system, you can easily time the trains so that anytime trains meet, it will be exactly at the stations....
Besides, 120persenger and 80kmph cargo is the average speed after calculating all the factors..... its not the maximum speed... there is a pic in which the SGR guys were showing UK the details of the rail and maximum speed was 160kmph ...... and remember when its finished it will be electrified which will futher increase its speed so ambia huyo mzungu mweupe aache kuwa hater
And just look how fast the writter skipped talking about South Africa which has the most connectedrail network in Africa even though some were built by the dutch long time ago when rail building technology wasnt that advanced? He justs skips that and goes to attack all chinies build ones and blames us for not maintaining the old colonial one which to him is in much better state
I will bring you an article that predicted that a chinies built superhighway (Thika road) will have potholes and damages before the end of 3 years and that fast cars wont be able to drive past 120kmph without being thrown off the road and that the highway will crumble after 5years since chinies technology is weaker compated to western technology... and here were are..thika highway still standing
Muria
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Well, the very same Economist also said not long ago that TZ has a president who "governs by gesture" under an article “Government by gesture – A president who looks good but governs impulsively”. I wonder if thats also true....
His source is mr geza..😀
Dhuks
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Ati Thika road ni 30km?
The financers definitely know what they financed
http://www.afdb.org/en/news-and-eve...-a-national-pride-president-mwai-kibaki-9986/
Kafrican
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In both articles, there are some truths.... but it seems they have a neck for blowing things (especially about Africa) completely out if proportion. .......
The economist are the same guys who called Africa the hopeless continent in early 2000 and in their professional economic prediction we had no hope of improving at all....and then ten years later (a mere 2 presidential terms) they had to swallow thier pride and go back and say the hopefull continent... after top 10 of fastest growing countries were 90% from Africa, we (as a continent)had the highest % increase in FDI. ........ some of us thought the economist had learned their lesson but aparently not that much.........
Am not saying that what they say is completely false, but they have to give us alittle more credit than that, they ptedict doom to almost everything in Africa
Quickly
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- Jul 14, 2015
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Most western newspapers and magazines have racist pasts. Many used to run slave auction/capture adverts in the past. My point:nothing much has changed since. ĺ