Dar es Salaam. Fatma rides on the shoulder of the road, her infant daughter secured to her back with a length of brightly coloured kanga fabric.
Arms outstretched, she grasps the handles that
function as pedals and rotates the chain around a gear, propelling
herself through Dar es Salaam’s heavy traffic.
On roads that claim upwards of 10,000 lives every year, people who cannot walk take on the traffic in hand-pedalled tricycles.
“If I don’t use my bike, it would be very hard for my family to survive,” she says.
The roads are not just dangerous for those with
disabilities. With five million inhabitants, Tanzania’s commercial and
administrative capital is growing beyond the capacity of its
infrastructure.
Trucks, buses and private vehicles share the road
with daladalas, which are sometimes so crammed that passengers have to
disembark through rear windows.
Battered motorcycles and autorickshaws (bajajis)negotiate the space between cars, speeding along sidewalks and darting into opposing traffic to gain a few extra metres.
Vendors form a slow procession between the cars, selling everything from fire extinguishers to cowboy hats and self-help books.
“Most people spend up to 43 days a year stuck in
their car,” says Mejah Mbuya, the founder of UWABA, Dar es Salaam’s
cycling advocacy group.
“I’m talking about people who are spending two hours to go to work and two hours to go back home.”
On these gridlocked streets, cyclists are trying to lay claim to a piece of the road.
During the annual Cycle Caravan, more than 400
people took to the streets to advocate for cyclists’ rights and to
encourage policymakers to recognise that bike lanes help make cities
more livable and also save lives.
Mbuya has been organising the event since 2006, and is passionate about the benefits of cycling not only for the health of individuals, but also for the health of cities.
It is not only drivers who need to be mindful of cyclists, but also city planners and highway engineers, he says.
“They have to plan including people and people who cycle - not only for cars and buildings.”
The city’s planned solution to the jams is a new infrastructure scheme called the Dar Rapid Transit Project.
Scheduled for completion in 2015, the project will rehabilitate 21 kilometres (13 miles) of trunk road to introduce a speedy bus system.
“We are working very hard to keep up with the pace, to design an intensive master plan with Dar es Salaam,” says Jerry William Silaa, the mayor of Illala Municipal Council, which includes the city centre.
Sporting a helmet and reflector vest at the Cycle Caravan, he says the plans also include dedicated bike lanes.
“We are trying to make the city live another 100 years to come because with this growth we are going to reach a population of 15 million people and go to mega-city criteria by the year 2025.”
Dar es Salaam, along with other rapidly urbanising cities in east Africa, must follow the smart cities model and become more sustainable and innovative, the mayor says.
Other government responses to urban sprawl have included a recent ban on semi-formal modes of public transportation, like motorcycles and autorickshaws, in the town centre. But this has failed to alleviate congestion in the busy area.
“The thing with infrastructure is that it’s a socio-technical system, and so you might improve the technical aspect of it, but then the social and economic side might undo all the good work that you’ve done,” says economist Angela Ambroz, a researcher on urbanisation. source The citizen
Mbuya has been organising the event since 2006, and is passionate about the benefits of cycling not only for the health of individuals, but also for the health of cities.
It is not only drivers who need to be mindful of cyclists, but also city planners and highway engineers, he says.
“They have to plan including people and people who cycle - not only for cars and buildings.”
The city’s planned solution to the jams is a new infrastructure scheme called the Dar Rapid Transit Project.
Scheduled for completion in 2015, the project will rehabilitate 21 kilometres (13 miles) of trunk road to introduce a speedy bus system.
“We are working very hard to keep up with the pace, to design an intensive master plan with Dar es Salaam,” says Jerry William Silaa, the mayor of Illala Municipal Council, which includes the city centre.
Sporting a helmet and reflector vest at the Cycle Caravan, he says the plans also include dedicated bike lanes.
“We are trying to make the city live another 100 years to come because with this growth we are going to reach a population of 15 million people and go to mega-city criteria by the year 2025.”
Dar es Salaam, along with other rapidly urbanising cities in east Africa, must follow the smart cities model and become more sustainable and innovative, the mayor says.
Other government responses to urban sprawl have included a recent ban on semi-formal modes of public transportation, like motorcycles and autorickshaws, in the town centre. But this has failed to alleviate congestion in the busy area.
“The thing with infrastructure is that it’s a socio-technical system, and so you might improve the technical aspect of it, but then the social and economic side might undo all the good work that you’ve done,” says economist Angela Ambroz, a researcher on urbanisation. source The citizen
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