We have observed without elation the failure of the Bus Rapid Transit (BRT) system in the nation’s capital otherwise called Aayalolo.
If Aayalolo in Ga means ‘still moving’, we wish to demur and state alternatively that ‘Ayaa koraa’, to wit ‘there is no movement at all.’
Having started during the Kufuor regime, the well-intentioned social intervention project, one of many at the time, is still struggling to find its feet; its beneficiaries only a handful of city residents.
Many do not even know how to hike rides in the beautiful buses because their ways are different. You do not just walk to the bus stop and board with your money, purchases of tickets done through a special arrangement not known to many including some of us.
We have learnt that this arrangement is to obviate fraud on the part of personnel. Good but at a cost.
Be it as it may, something is not right and the buses are largely white elephants, only a few residents patronizing them.
With every novelty the need for evaluation cannot be overemphasized. It is on this note that we ask that policymakers go back to the drawing board and determine how to alter the ways of this wonderful social intervention project so that it can serve the people rather than add to the traffic jams on our already choked roads.
The efforts put in by the originators of the project are wonderful, intended as it were to make life easy for patrons of the service. Unfortunately, the so-called special parking arrangements for such buses in the nation’s capital are not serving the purpose for which they were fashioned out.
We have observed the construction of a brand new terminus in Accra Central, the old PWD headquarters for the buses, another wonderful effort.
If only some aspects of the efforts are directed at unearthing how to make the buses more accessible to the people for which the service was launched that would have been great.
The city is choked and movements are day in and day out becoming more challenging and inconveniencing. With the Yuletide around the corner the situation is becoming even more aggravated.
We have the expertise to find out how to address the commuting needs of the citizens of course using the luxurious buses at our disposal.
We would be blunt and state that the BRT as currently constituted has not met the expectations of the people and requires recalibration in a manner which would make it more accessible to majority of the people.
Here is to also call on the authorities to do more about the commuter railway system between Nsawam and Accra as a way of easing the vehicular traffic jams on the Amasaman to Accra route.
With an enhanced BRT and a functional commuter railway service as aforementioned we can bet that the inconveniences being endured by residents of Accra and its extended segments would be eased.
Both the Transport and the Railway Ministries have a role to play in these directions.
Spending two hours commuting between Amasaman and Accra Central is simply unacceptable, especially when there are solutions to this challenge.