Infrastructure News

It seems like the new ministers are now on a run to outdo each other by proposing one or the other new infrastructure project. Take for example this one about upgrading the railway. It has taken Kenya 40years to realise that the railway needs an upgrade. The talk is to change the line to standard gauge and electrify the line. While Kenya Railways would be upgrading the line, RVR will be left to run the meter gauge railway in the meantime. Furthermore, no one seems to know/say where 20% of the Ksh.80billion needed for the exercise will come from. Man, Kenya cannot even afford 300m for its minsters so where will she get Ksh.16b? Is this just empty talk to keep peoples minds of the issues?

The Kilindini Port REALLY needs to be upgraded. This is way overdue. A harbour in Lamu to service Ethiopia will be even better wince it will service bigger ships and hopefully sort out the insecurity problems in the area at least. I also wonder why the cruise terminal has not been built. I know the argument has been that there are not enough ships docking in, but what happens if Dar builds one first in the region? Build one, market it and the ships will dock!
Oh and to add to that, the Kenya Navy is the one that should be sorting out the pirates along the Somali coast. It is Kenya that gets affected by piracy. I hope this will happen soon as our politicians like using defence projects for shady deals leading to things like the Navy ordering ships from someone without experience in building war ships!

As someone who has been using Kisumu airport on a regular basis, it is also long due for expansion. The runway has to be lengthened to accommodate bigger planes and the terminal size increased to deal with the increased passenger numbers. I do not see the road between Kisumu - Kericho - Nakuru being repaired any time soon.

Another story talks of current houses in Shauri Moyo being destroyed and new 3 bedroomed ones being built. I wonder how long this has been in planning since no mention is made of temporarily relocating the current tenants or at least giving the temporary accommodation till the works are finished. I wonder if the 1-1.6m price tag for the houses is subsidised (normal house costs about Ksh24,000/sqm) and by whom? Will they do something about Jogoo Road since they are increasing the density in the area?