Kitengela’s precast hotel

Kaputei Safariland Hotel under construction

The Athi River-Kitengela-Namanga route is known more for nyama choma and road trips, than hotels. Something this development hopes to change.

Sitting on three acres in Kitengela, six-storey Kaputiei Safariland Hotel will be the first of its kind here in more ways than one. 

“The precast technology, which we have used to construct the hotel has cut our completion time by almost 70 per cent. Since we are already four months into work, by August we will be done,” says Denis Mumias, of Mudijo enterprises and the project manager.

Precast is a building technology made by casting concrete in a mold. After curing, it is transported to the construction site and lifted into place.

With precast technology having gained ground among residential developments, the hotel is in good company.

This comes at a time when tourism industry numbers are pointing out that the industry recorded a 20.3 percent growth last year to post earnings of Sh120 billion despite the long electioneering period.

This is an improvement from the Sh99.69 billion earned in 2016.

During the Inter-county games in 2017 hosted by Machakos County, guests had a rough time getting accommodation.

“We were unable to offer enough living space for the guest inflows from Machakos county, which hosted the games. This gave us a wakeup call,” Kaputiei Safariland Hotel’s General Manager Shem Timothy says.

The hotel is nestled in the middle of the vast plains and towering in between posh estates, such as Banito estate, and Plains View estate, with a panoramic view of the northern animal migration corridor and Nairobi National park.

The ‘original’ hotel, which they are looking forward to expand when they open up the hotel, has a capacity of 35 rooms. The new facility will have an additional 93 rooms.

But, why Kitengela a place where they already have an existing 35 bed capacity hotel?

Shem says this has to do with the market gap.

He says Kitengela has a weekly inflow of more than 1,000 guests from other places every week.

“Kitengela is only 25 kilometres from the Kajiado County Headquarters. With this alongside other NGOs who have staff working in the area, there is a huge market in the area,” Shem says.

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