BY The Citizen
We must pay credit where it is due: there are visible efforts by the government to improve infrastructure in the city of Dar es Salaam. One doesn’t have to be a professional surveyor or city planner to appreciate the upgrading works that have taken place over the past 20 years.
The Magomeni-Fire stretch on the Morogoro Road, for instance, was up to 1980s the nightmare of motorists; now it is smooth sailing except maybe during the usual peak hours.
The once treacherous Sam Nujoma Road is now a dual carriageway. And now the Mwenge-Tegeta road has become a virtual driver’s paradise, so to speak. Before the completion of the dual carriageway, it took up to three hours to cover the 20km distance; it presently takes much less than 20 minutes!
We are all eagerly looking forward to the completion of the Dar es Salaam Rapid Transit Project (DART) that is expected to take commuting in the city to the next level, literally.
The new daladala bus terminal at Ubungo is yet another remarkable infrastructural improvement for Dar es Salaam. The good layout and facilities, complete with a splendid washroom facility, are commendable (much as critics say the earthen road linking it to the Sam Nujoma Road makes a mockery of the new establishment).
We can go on and on underscoring the fact that visible progress is being made to improve infrastructure in Tanzania’s commercial city. However, we have an overriding concern with regard to our maintenance culture. On the Mwenge –Tegeta Road, which was commissioned by President Kikwete only earlier this month, signs of wanton damage are already visible. Do vandals know it costs some Sh2 billion to build just one kilometre of a tarmac road? Wanton vandalism of our infrastructure should be viewed as economic sabotage! Yes, because that is exactly what it is
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