New system to replace traffic police on roads

Police officers who man some of the intersections of city roads for hours’ under the scorching sun and heavy rains will now breathe a sigh of relief once a new traffic management system is commissioned.

The new system dubbed Nairobi Intelligent Transport systems will replace traffic cops on all the junctions from August. Already, the new system that will cost 6.5 billion has been piloted in some of the city roads intersections including City mortuary roundabout, Kibera Junction around Uchumi, Yaya Centre, Dennis Pritt – Lenana road junction and Loitok-tok Road junction.

Other junctions are intersections around Kileleshwa Police Station, River-Side junction towards Arboretum and Ngong road junction then Westlands area.

“KURA has successfully implemented an Intelligent Transport Systems pilot project in 10 junctions along Nairobi’s Western Ring Road and Ngong Road which has generally reduced snarl-ups,” KURA Director General John Cheboi stated.

The police will, however, be monitoring the activities of traffic flow from the control room situated at the City Cabanas office. This means that the cameras will be monitoring traffic lights and these will be observed by officers seated in an office at cabanas.

"Traffic lights will be monitored by the cameras and send the on time signal to the control room of the situation at the intersections," said Cheboi.

Based on traffic flow, the system will direct the traffic lights on intervals of right of way. Already Kenya Urban Roads Authority has conducted a successful test on 10 junctions in Nairobi that are prone to heavy traffic jams, mostly on Fridays. Cheboi said the model has proved effective in managing traffic hence removing the necessity of all traffic police at road intersections.

A statement from KURA said that the agency has already awarded a consultancy contract to Cheil engineering company, a Korean Consortium for the implementation of the first phase. Under the contract, the consortium will among them provide guidance during bid evaluation, negotiation, supervision of engineering design and construction of traffic Management system at a cost of Sh548 million.

Phase 2 of the project will involve junction improvement installation of the facilities for 81 intersections.