Mega transit buses to change face, pace of Nairobi commuter services

The inside setting of the new City Shuttle Bus which caught Nairobians by surprise when the bus took a test drive along Nairobi's streets before they officially start operating the 13 bus seater. [Photo/Elvis Ogina (Nairobi) August 24th,2016.

A new-look transit bus is stirring excitement and panic around the city of Nairobi.

The long bus is already drawing in hundreds of curious passers-by, most of whom are amazed by its sheer size. Even before it is licenced to ply the city’s routes, the passenger service vehicle (PSV) is sending cold chills down the spine of matatu operators, who say it will drive them out of business.

The Ashok Leyland-made bus has a capacity of 130 passengers — 60 seated and about 70 standing and the latter will still find their ride comfortable than those seated in ordinary matatus.

The bus is spacious — it has enough legroom to accommodate the tallest of passengers — and has fluffy seats, and fans on every window.

For safety purposes, it has four emergency exits and First Aid kits, items required by law on every PSV but which most vehicles either lack or have but are not in working order.

The bus, registered under the City Shuttle Company, was recently test-driven around the city by Ministry of Transport and Infrastructure and National Transport and Safety Authority (NTSA) officials.

A handful of city residents were invited to board it from Mombasa Road to town, Community and Upper Hill areas.

The journey started at the Truckmart showroom on Mombasa Road to the Central Business District, through to the Ministry of Infrastructure offices at Community, to NTSA offices in Upper Hill and ended in town.

“This is way better than matatus. I cannot even feel it negotiate a corner,” said Caroline Gichui, one of lucky passengers on the vehicle’s maiden trip in Nairobi.

The bus, whose registered dealer in the country is Truckmart East Africa, requires the keenness of a pilot in a driver. After all, it is the size of a middle-sized passenger plane.

The transit bus is 17 metres long, according to Mechul Sachdev of Truckmart EA.

Put simply, it is like two buses conjoined with a spring-like disk device that makes it possible for the rear wheels to rotate just like the front ones for easy navigation.

If the front tyres run over an item, say, an orange, it is guaranteed that the rear tyres run over the same orange at the same spot. This mechanism allows the enormous bus to negotiate corners effortlessly.

Lagos experience

“The idea of bringing the Ashok Leyland mega buses to Kenya was sparked by its success in Nigeria’s capital Lagos, which previously experienced bad traffic jams,” Sachdev said. “There are about 2,000 such buses in Lagos and they are exactly what the city of Nairobi needs. We had transit buses in Kenya before and it was a major success.”

But already, operators in the multi-billion matatu industry are a worried lot over what they say is a ploy to drive them out of business.

Led by Matatu Welfare Association (MWA) Chairperson Dickson Mbugua, the operators say such buses require express lanes dedicated to the Rapid Transport buses, the type of infrastructure that Nairobi lacks. “We do not even have a clear perimeter of where the Central Business District starts and where it ends in Nairobi,” Mbugua said.

Richard Momanyi, a driver with the Embassava Sacco that plies the CBD-Embakasi route, says the introduction of the mega buses will make an already bad situation worse, especially for people like him. “The transport sector is already crowded,” he said. Mr Momanyi’s fears are not only on the dwindling income, but also space at the designated stages.

“No operator will want a bus that ‘eats’ up the space of four 14-seaters or two 51-seaters,” he said.

But City Shuttle Director Samuel Kamau said the buses are only meant to complement the existing matatus.

“We are targeting 60 units on every route to ensure traffic gridlocks are dealt with completely,” Kamau said.

Already, there are four such buses in Nairobi, all under the ownership of City Shuttle. Martin Eshiwani, the Head of Road Transport at the Ministry of Infrastructure, said it will take time before the buses are allowed on the roads.

He said there are concerns about their maneuverability on round-abouts and through the rather congested central business district.

“But this is one of the ways that we hope to reduce traffic on our roads,” Eshiwani said.