A recent study indicates that at least three of every ten years spent in Lagos is lost to traffic. It means Lagosians spend an average of seven hours 20 minutes in traffic every day.
The long hours spent daily in traffic with its attendant economic as well as health, emotional and relational costs is colossal. For a potential megacity and the economic hub of the country it shows the incapacity and lack of visionary leadership, despite media campaigns and allusions to the contrary.
Lagos is the commercial, economic, as well as financial capital of Nigeria accounting for over 50 percent of Nigeria’s industrial and commercial establishments, as well as 70 percent of manufacturing activities. In addition, it has the most active stock exchange in West Africa; its four ports collectively handle about 75 and 90 percent of the country’s imports and non-oil exports by weight respectively. Even more, its international airport handles about 80 percent of airborne exports and imports and 80 percent of passenger movements in and out of the country.
The state’s population has continued to grow rapidly – put at between six to eight percent per annum – and is a dragnet for school leavers and other economic migrants from other parts of the country. It is projected that the population of the city will grow to 36 million by 2020.
Despite its huge population and importance, road is the city’s most common and available means of transport. Rail and water transportation are relatively under-developed in Lagos. Years of military rule, underinvestment and poor maintenance of existing transport infrastructure has seen Lagos lag behind other major cities in the utilisation of efficient public transportation system such as urban rail system and modern high capacity buses.
As at 2006, it was estimated that the city’s transport infrastructure and services were at levels that supported a population of six million some 20 years ago. In 2006, the government developed a transport master plan to integrate road, water, rail, and cable-car transport to provide one of the most efficient systems of transportation in a megacity. Shortly after, in 2008, the Bus Rapid Transit (BRT) was launched as a stop-gap measure while seven train lines were planned to link all parts of the states and even Ogun state with light rail.
However, due to paucity of funds, only the contract for the blue line (the 27-kilometre Badagry line running from Okokomaiko to Marina via Iddo) was awarded at the colossal cost of $1.2 billion (compared to similar projects in other parts of Africa awarded for just a fraction of that amount) to be completed in 2011. It was projected others will be awarded subsequently and the entire master plan will be completed in 2020.
The absence of a modern transport infrastructure in Lagos and the consequent heavy traffic gridlocks on the roads comes with huge costs to the city and its inhabitants, the state, the country and the economy. Sometime in 2015, the governor revealed that the state loses over N250 billion to traffic annually. This is besides the billions of naira lost to businesses and families daily due to the excruciating traffic jam; commuters spend four or more hours in a 30 minute journey.
The economic, health, emotional and relational cost of traffic in Lagos is unacceptable. Worse is when the state allows the few roads to deteriorate without repair or fails to maintain law and order on the roads. While we clamour for the development of other means of transportation, we call on the government to learn to efficiently manage the few roads and infrastructure available to ease the suffering on hapless Lagosians.
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