Kenya SGR to be extended to Kisumu
Posted: 19 May 2017, 15:46
Uhuru seeks Sh370bn more to extend railway to Kisumu
I don't have an inside track to this, but I think the original plan was Mombasa-Kampala. However now it appears that Uganda has decided to buy in to the Tanzanian SGR project, so Kenya is looking for other options and has chosen Kisumu. Cynics might say that the timing of the announcement is not unconnected with the upcoming elections: the SGR is seen as President Uhuru's pet project, and Kisumu is an opposition area, so this announcement could perhaps be a sop to them.
Railway enthusiasts will be very happy to see a railway link from Nairobi to Kisumu once again, as no trains have run on the old metre-gauge route for many years. I suppose one has to question the commercial viability of it, though. Certainly it doesn't seem to be a major freight route compared to the original plan to take freight to Kampala and beyond (potentially including Rwanda, South Sudan and DRC), as Kisumu is a bit of a dead end now that lake traffic is almost non-existent. Kisumu is a big city and its environs is densely populated, and there is a huge bus industry between Kisumu and Nairobi. Passenger rail could be a viable alternative, but only if the fare is low enough to compete with buses - and if it is, would the railway be economically viable? As for the middle classes who might wish to travel between Nairobi and Kisumu faster, more comfortably and more safely than the bus, there are already cheap flights to and from Kisumu's new international airport.
In Summary
- The Chinese loan used on the SGR is expected to cross the Sh1 trillion mark by the time the Kisumu section is extended to Malaba.
- The ministry says the trains will charge as low as half of the current bus fare for a third-class ticket.
- Kenya admitted it would be unable to handle the security operations of the SGR and asked China to stand in.
I don't have an inside track to this, but I think the original plan was Mombasa-Kampala. However now it appears that Uganda has decided to buy in to the Tanzanian SGR project, so Kenya is looking for other options and has chosen Kisumu. Cynics might say that the timing of the announcement is not unconnected with the upcoming elections: the SGR is seen as President Uhuru's pet project, and Kisumu is an opposition area, so this announcement could perhaps be a sop to them.
Railway enthusiasts will be very happy to see a railway link from Nairobi to Kisumu once again, as no trains have run on the old metre-gauge route for many years. I suppose one has to question the commercial viability of it, though. Certainly it doesn't seem to be a major freight route compared to the original plan to take freight to Kampala and beyond (potentially including Rwanda, South Sudan and DRC), as Kisumu is a bit of a dead end now that lake traffic is almost non-existent. Kisumu is a big city and its environs is densely populated, and there is a huge bus industry between Kisumu and Nairobi. Passenger rail could be a viable alternative, but only if the fare is low enough to compete with buses - and if it is, would the railway be economically viable? As for the middle classes who might wish to travel between Nairobi and Kisumu faster, more comfortably and more safely than the bus, there are already cheap flights to and from Kisumu's new international airport.