Kenya’s most famous road is crumbling, here is the evidence

What was left after a motorist knocked down barriers at the Ruaraka exchange. PHOTO | JEFF ANGOTE

What you need to know:

  • Everyone is in a hurry on Thika Road. Everyone.
  • Yes, Thika superhighway is no longer that super.

Superhighway, super loss:When Mwai Kibaki two years ago cut the ribbon to open this road, he billed it as a great example of Kenya’s efforts to transform itself into a strong economic hub for the region and beyond.

This road is an important commercial and transport corridor serving the densely populated areas of Kasarani, Githurai, Kahawa, Zimmermann, Ruiru, and Juja as well as the rapidly growing Thika town, Kibaki said, and also links the main commercial centres in the Mt Kenya region, Isiolo, Marsabit, Moyale, and Mandera to Nairobi.

Moreover, this highway constitutes an important part of the regional and continental transport corridor from Cape Town to Cairo. However, it has been barely two years and the road is fast sliding into neglect and disrepair, as writer BILLY MUIRURI found out.

Anything you do, or attempt to do, on the 50 kilometres of winding tarmac between Nairobi and Thika could kill you. Crossing the 12-laner on foot is a no-no, few dare use the foot bridges, you cannot drive at 70kph here as some kamikaze driver will be sniffing your rear bumper and honking like crazy, and woe unto you if you have failing eyesight and find yourself here at night as the street lights do not work.

Should your car break down here and you put out your safety triangles, you will spend half of the time dodging semi-trailers, buses, miraa-toting Proboxes, and the occasional boda-boda rider on a suicide mission.

And there is no guarantee that you will take back the triangles after you are done with the repairs because chances are that all the suicide drivers will miss hitting you, but not the triangles.

Everyone is in a hurry on Thika Road. Everyone. Maybe they are lured to their deaths by the wide, open spaces, the 12 lanes on which to display their prowess behind the wheel, or maybe they are pushed to test the muscle of their machines by everyone around them, the screeching and honking and cacophonic frenzy.

Whichever way, Thika Road is fast becoming notorious for its daily madness. But that is just the tip of the iceberg, for if you have a keen eye, you will notice that Kenya’s most modern road is crumbling.

Barely two years after it was opened by former President Mwai Kibaki, sections of the road have been ripped off, guard rails knocked down, drainage systems blocked, and you will be lucky to catch a working street light on the 50-kilometre stretch from Pangani to Thika.

At the Pangani-Park Road interchange, vehicles leaving Murang’a and Pangani roads to join the superhighway have a tendency to kiss the concrete barrier, while the Survey of Kenya-Utalii Hotel area has become an accident hotspot as drivers zooming from Muthaiga frequently miss the corner and smash into the barriers.

Metres away, just as you go past the GSU headquarters using the service lane, vehicles speeding towards Roasters frequently miss the entry to the main highway and knock the rail guards into the drainage line running parallel to the road.

The destruction is repeated all the way to Thika and engineers who recently inspected the road estimated that, less than 500 days since this road was opened, motorists and vandals have caused damage worth Sh50 million.

NO LONGER SUPER

Recently at the Garden Estate interchange, a motorist who was leaving Roasters Inn missed the road and ploughed into the barriers. The car was towed away, but the damage remained.

A few metres away, two motorists took the wrong turn after leaving Natives Restaurant and Lodge. A policeman who spotted them gave chase and the aftermath of that brief encounter is visible in the dislodged concrete blocks that bore the brunt of the escaping motorists.

Yes, Thika superhighway is no longer that super. The indiscipline of Kenyan drivers is ripping apart this otherwise beautiful road, and police seem to be incapable of stopping the mayhem.

The traffic jam in the morning, which disappeared when Mwai Kibaki cut that ribbon to open the road, is now back, slowly inching its way towards Roysambu.

The Roysambu area is itself testimony to all that went wrong with the highway.

Engineers designed two bus stops, one on either side of the service lanes, but matatus and buses prefer to pick and drop passengers on the main road, blocking this section and exposing other motorists to danger.

The engineers also constructed a footbridge to connect the Zimmermann side with Kasarani, but pedestrians prefer to dart across the road, over the guard rails, and up the slopes on either side.

When the sun sets, the bridge, like many others on this road, becomes home to muggers who take advantage of the lack of lighting to terrorise pedestrians.

A hawker named Wanjiru Kariuki told us that she cannot use the footbridge at night as she has heard of “at least two rapes and several muggings”, one of which, she added, was fatal.

Of the 14 security lights installed by the Kenya National Highways Authority (KeNHA) here, 10 have been vandalised while the remaining four are malfunctioning. The Zimmermann-Kasarani interchange, therefore, is a robbers’ den between sunset and sunrise.

A drive towards Ruiru and Juja towns only reveals more scars, with the area near Ruiru at Clayworks and the weighbridge near Juja being termed by police as accident black spots. To make matters worse, although the contract to build the road included lighting it up all the way to Thika, less than 10 per cent of the stretch is ever lit.

Last week DN2 spotted a team from Intex Construction and Sinohydro, the companies that won a joint tender to maintain the superhighway, inspecting the damage, but it would take a few months, if not years, to bring back the lost glory.

Asked how they planned to use the Sh1.1 billion awarded to them for maintenance by the Kenya National Highways Authority, the companies’ directors referred our queries to the motorways regulator.

At KeNHA, spokesman Charles Njogu said Sinohydro and Intex had been tasked with routine maintenance of the road and that they were already on site.

“The contract has just been given,” said Njogu, “and the real work on the broken infrastructure has begun.”

Njogu said the original budget, financed by the African Development Bank, did not factor in maintenance, which probably explains the slow pace of the repairs.

The contract involves filling up potholes, cracks, joints and spalls, as well as clearing of litter and removal of dead animals and any other obstructions.

The two-year contract took effect on 1 May this year and is expected to end in April 2016. The contractor will be liable for any defects thereafter for one year and the contract could be extended by six months if the contractor meets all obligations.

According to George Kiiru, the maintenance manager at KeNHA, repairs will be done on earthen shoulders, foot paths, traffic lights, road markings, and bridge railings.

The contractor will also maintain the landscape by pruning trees and bushes and conduct emergency works in case of accidents or natural phenomena such as strong storms, floods, or earth slides.