Residents: New railway line is not good enough

BY PIUS MAUNDU

@piusmaundu

piusmaundu@yahoo.com

Communities living near the standard gauge railway line will face challenges accessing water and electricity across the railway once the project is completed, it has emerged.

A meeting between community leaders, government administrators, Kenya Railways Corporation and the railway builder in Makindu Town on Tuesday heard that the design of the railway line lacks conduits to pass water, electricity and other utilities.

“It’s true the new railway design lacks provisions for these conduits,” said Mr John Nyandiko, a Kenya Railways engineer.

Acknowledging that the railway designers erred by not installing the provisions for the service wayleaves, Mr Nyandiko said that he would consult relevant authorities for a possible review of the project design, something the community leaders dismissed as a tall order.

They complained that their previous bids to get undesirable aspects of the Sh 327 billion project revised have been unsuccessful.

“We have complained about underpasses that are not passable, and lack of channels of channeling storm water away from our homes but none of these aspects have been reworked,” said Mr Kyengo Mutavi.

He singled out a underpass near Kiboko Market that doubles as a channel to drain storm water, decrying that its double usage will inconvenience communities determined to access either side of the railway line during the rain season.  

“Currently, its a difficult to get water pipelines across the old railway line,” said Mr Mutavi, registering his fear that with the huge embankment that characterizes the new railway line, it would be more impossible to move the services across.  

Area Sub-County Commissioner Ms Naomi Mwangi, who chaired the meeting, concurred that the absence of the service ducts is potentially inconveniencing.

“I am going to write to Kenya Railways to ensure that your complaints addressed,” she told the community members.

She urged the railway contractor to move with speed and stop damaging roads while delivering building materials, to stop blowing dust on villagers and to address emerging complaints by the community members.

Mr Goodluck Zeng, a CRBC official told the meeting that he could not understand how the utility passages were missing out on the project design since Kenya Power and water companies had been consulted at the design stage.

However, he said that in future utility service providers will not lack ways of getting their services across the railway line and the the villagers should not panic.

According to reports, the Chinese contractor is almost done with civil works on the Mombasa-Nairobi railway line.