By Mohamed Jaward Nyallay
The Sierra Leone Road Safety Authority (SLRSA) is contemplating a ban on long buses entering the busy Commercial Business District (CBD) of Freetown, Politico has learnt.
Officials say the move, which is under active discussion among relevant stakeholders in the transportation sector, is geared towards reducing heavy traffic in the city center.
Representatives of the transport sector workers, Police and SLRSA met last week to discuss details of the proposed plan, which basically entails that long buses plying the east end of the city into Goderich Street and Regent Road terminate at Cline Town.
David Panda Noah, SLRSAs’s Executive Director, said the move is part of their broader plan of decongesting the city.
“What we are trying to do is to decongest the CBD of vehicular traffic so we could have free flow movement of traffic and pedestrians, goods and services that will come into the city and return with minimum difficulties,” Mr Noah told Politico.
Freetown has a serious traffic problem. During rush hours in the morning and evening, some parts of the city almost shut down in gridlock. The situation in the east end of the city is widely thought to be the worst.
Superintendent Zainab Mbalu Gbla, National Traffic Coordinator at the Sierra Leone Police, said traffic within the city is mostly caused by buses and that that is why they were engaging owners of buses.
“You know we are on this decongestion drive. We have succeeded at Lumley and East End Police, but we found out that one of the major causes of traffic in the city is when big buses come into places like Goderich Street and break down. So that is why we have all come together to find a lasting solution,” she said.
According to Supt Gbla, the idea is that long buses will be prevented from entering the CBD at the peak or rush hours. They would however be allowed to enter during non-peak hours.
SLRSA is currently implementing an operation designed to clear major streets across the capital as part of this decongestion drive. They have done so, in collaboration with the Police, military and other related institutions, by demarcating foot paths for pedestrians and removing vehicles that are constantly parked on highways. Under this ‘Operation Push Back’, heavy duty trucks have been disallowed to park or offload in the capital for more than an hour.
Businessman Idrissa Daniel Kanu owns and operates one of the popular public transport buses in Sierra Leone. His fleet of 18 Pee Sounds buses operate across the country. Kanu represented fellow commercial transport bus owners at the meeting at SLRSA last Friday. He praised the plan but said they will have to consult with other bus owners.
“These are ways that government is trying to minimize the congestion. It is not bad. But we have asked for time to meet with our executives and return on Monday (June 17),” he told Politico shortly after the meeting.
“In business it is give and take. This is the pilot phase, if it works well for us and the passengers, then we will all continue with it,” he added.
Despite the level of understanding SLRSA and bus owners appear to have established on this issue, it is almost certain that the service users are going to have issue with the proposed arrangement.
And Noah said they have thought about this and that they were reviewing the routing system in the city to minimize the possible strain on passengers.
“We haven’t reached any definite agreement yet, but we have a committee now that is looking at rerouting of the whole transport system now since it has been a while that we looked at it. We also believe that the buses and mini-buses (poda-poda) drivers will come up with something concerning this,” he said.
Noah hopes that a deal could be reached early this next week, when major stakeholders in the sector would have agreed on the terms of this new arrangement.
“Once the deal is signed, it could go into effect right away,” he said.
The SLRSA traffic coordinator Supt Gbla said there are plans to roll out similar arrangement in other parts of the Western Area.
“We are trying to do the same at Waterloo and Jui. Every one of these operations is going on simultaneously,” she said.
“This is a pilot project; we just won’t be in the old system. We must find a way to improve. That is why we have called the Kekeh (Tricycle), poda-poda, bus and other vehicle owners to discuss.”
© 2019 Politico Online
