News / National
Masvingo city in traffic congestion headache
27 Dec 2020 at 03:06hrs | Views
MASVINGO City Council is grappling with congestion that has clogged local and international traffic at Mucheke Bridge, amid revelations that efforts to build an alternative route was stalled by lack of money.
Most of last week traffic was brought to a grinding halt for many hours along the road, which also serves as the gateway to Beitbridge border post.
Motorists are enduring long hours in the traffic jams and the situation has been worsened by the festive season that has seen large volumes of traffic going in and out of the country through Beitbridge.
Throughout the better part of last week, motorists were battling to drive inside and outside the CBD as long winding queues formed along the road.
Masvingo City Council public relations officer Ashleigh Jinjika told Sunday Southern Eye that efforts to build an alternative route for traffic on transit hit a brick wall due to lack of funding.
"As council, our biggest concern is the delays arising from congestion at Mucheke Bridge, which is now a bottleneck in the movement of local, national and international traffic," Jinjika said.
"An attempt by council to address this bottleneck by constructing an additional high-level bridge at Chimusana bridge was stalled after funding could not be secured."
In 2012 Masvingo City Council mulled the construction of Chimusana bridge and related link roads which were pegged at US$3,5 million.
"The council is now engaging the Transport and Infrastructural Development ministry to include the bridge as part of the ongoing Harare-Beitbridge Road upgrading project," Jinjika said.
Meanwhile, Masvingo City Council said the local authority needs more than US$50 million for road rehabilitation.
"There is need for funding to address the city-wide challenge of collapsed roads. A recent assessment put the cost of repairing the city's roads at just over US$50 million. The cost has certainly gone up given the condition of the roads today," Jinjika said.
"However, the challenge has always been on the funding for the roads which is grossly inadequate. Zinara disbursements for 2020 were just over ZW$4 million while the allocation for 2021 has improved at ZW$43,6 million, but is still 1% of the needs of the city.
"A roads levy instituted by council a few years ago to augment the low disbursements from Zinara, only levied US$230 000 and was used to rehabilitate Ingwe Drive and Jason Moyo Avenue as well as procurement of a grader, front-end loader and tipper."
Most of last week traffic was brought to a grinding halt for many hours along the road, which also serves as the gateway to Beitbridge border post.
Motorists are enduring long hours in the traffic jams and the situation has been worsened by the festive season that has seen large volumes of traffic going in and out of the country through Beitbridge.
Throughout the better part of last week, motorists were battling to drive inside and outside the CBD as long winding queues formed along the road.
Masvingo City Council public relations officer Ashleigh Jinjika told Sunday Southern Eye that efforts to build an alternative route for traffic on transit hit a brick wall due to lack of funding.
"As council, our biggest concern is the delays arising from congestion at Mucheke Bridge, which is now a bottleneck in the movement of local, national and international traffic," Jinjika said.
In 2012 Masvingo City Council mulled the construction of Chimusana bridge and related link roads which were pegged at US$3,5 million.
"The council is now engaging the Transport and Infrastructural Development ministry to include the bridge as part of the ongoing Harare-Beitbridge Road upgrading project," Jinjika said.
Meanwhile, Masvingo City Council said the local authority needs more than US$50 million for road rehabilitation.
"There is need for funding to address the city-wide challenge of collapsed roads. A recent assessment put the cost of repairing the city's roads at just over US$50 million. The cost has certainly gone up given the condition of the roads today," Jinjika said.
"However, the challenge has always been on the funding for the roads which is grossly inadequate. Zinara disbursements for 2020 were just over ZW$4 million while the allocation for 2021 has improved at ZW$43,6 million, but is still 1% of the needs of the city.
"A roads levy instituted by council a few years ago to augment the low disbursements from Zinara, only levied US$230 000 and was used to rehabilitate Ingwe Drive and Jason Moyo Avenue as well as procurement of a grader, front-end loader and tipper."
Source - the standard
