Kenya to save Sh12b from new road maintenance technology

NAIROBI: The government could save up to Sh12 billion on road maintenance if a newly introduced technology on road patching is embraced.

The technology from Velocity, a United Kingdom based company specialised in road emergency and repair is said to have the ability to reduce the cost of maintaining roads by 40 percent.
This is through their new product of road patching that is customized to repair potholes in less than five minutes.

All national and county governments have to do is invest Sh50 million on a fully equipped truck which will come with already trained personnel that will see the allocation of Sh29 billion for road maintenance reduce significantly.

"An average pothole in Kenya would take more than four days and close to ten workers to have it fully repaired. This is time consuming considering traffic is held for days inconveniencing other people and costing the government millions," said Avery East Africa boss Nicholus Kithinji during the launch.

Kithinji said with adoption of this technology the average cost of Sh3, 500 to repair a single pothole will reduce by 40 per cent: "This mean the government can focus on other factors that are said to cause the potholes namely sewage and drainage systems. This will be creating even more avenue of employment in these sectors."

Unlike how Kenya does repair by excavating the hole again before filling it up which is said to cause potential cracks, the technology involves applying pressurised air to remove all dust and debris from the hole.

A cold bitumen emulsion is then forced into the cracks at high pressure penetrating into every crack sealing all defects and preventing water from getting in.

"As we have seen, the innovation is fast, efficient and clean since there is reduced carbon emission. However we need to look into other details like quality of the materials used, its perceived cost effectiveness before we can have it adopted," said Kenya National Highway Authority (KeNHA) Eng George Kiiru General Manager Maintenance.

According to the World Health Organisation report 2015, over 1.2 million of road accidents are caused by potholes, humps or poor roads. In Kenya, road accidents are said to cost the country 5.6 per cent of its Gross Domestic Product which is equivalent to an annual loss of Sh300 billion.