The lecturer said the growing congestion threatens economic viability and aggravates pollution and energy consumption.
A former Permanent Secretary in the Lagos State Ministry of Transport, Taiwo Salaam, has said if the traffic congestion in the densely populated Nigeria’s commercial capital city of Lagos should continue unaddressed till 2030, the city is estimated to lose as much as 21 billion dollars every month.
Mr Salaam, now a Senior Lecturer and Head of the Department of Transport Technology and Infrastructure at the School of Transport and Logistics, Lagos State University (LASU), Ojo, said this while delivering the school’s third distinguished lecture series.
He spoke on the theme; “The Evolution of Transport, Congestion and Traffic Management in Metropolitan Lagos”.
Mr Salaam said although traffic congestion is the most prevalent and intractable of the challenges facing urban transportation in developing countries especially Lagos, the population and size of the state are the major contributors to the challenge.
He said the growing congestion in the state threatens economic viability and aggravates pollution and energy consumption.
Statistics
Quoting statistics of the socio-economic consequences of traffic congestion across various cities globally, the guest lecturer said the rate at which the population of Lagos is growing has further complicated the city’s traffic problem.
He said Lagos is currently growing at between seven and eight per cent yearly, adding that the population growth percentage rate is 10 times faster than those of New York and Los Angeles cities in the United States of America.
He added that Lagos currently accommodates 40 per cent of the total registered vehicles in Nigeria.
He said Lagos is confronted with the challenges of developing a transportation system that serves its citizenry in terms of safety, accessibility, affordability, reliability, efficiency, and comfortability.
Mr Salaam said; “The capacity to do so is affected and influenced by such factors as population, finances, policy environment, constitutional constraints and citizens’ attitudes, among others.
“The economic growth of Lagos among the cities in Nigeria has placed it in a vantage position for prosperity. However, its greatest challenge remains the movement of goods and services against the backdrop of its rapid population and phenomenal growth rate.
“The city had an average of 224 vehicles per km in 2006 as against the national average of 11 vehicles per km. The Nigeria national average in 2009 was estimated at 30 vehicles per km, Lagos had moved to 300. In addition, the city has over 1.4 million registered vehicles, and approximately 2.5 million vehicles are on the road daily, weekend inclusive.”
Pollution
The lecturer said transportation pollutes the air more after industrial factories and that the development leads to health issues, and climate change at a higher cost.
He said the World Bank has reported that at least 30,000 people die every year from pollution in Nigeria.
“According to the bank, pollution is a huge problem in many cities globally, including Lagos, which is notorious for its large population, high concentration of motor vehicles and industrial pollution, this further shows that an estimation of 20 million people lives in an area of less than 100 square kilometres in Lagos, which leads to a suffocating mix of air pollution, single-use plastic pollution and solid waste in the city’s streets causing respiratory problems, floodings and other illnesses among the locals,” he said.
Automated Guideway Transit as solution
Proffering solutions to traffic gridlock in the state, Mr Salaam, who has a certificate in transport management and is the chairman of Chartered Institute of Transport Administration of Nigeria, (CIOTA), suggested Automated Guideway Transit (AGT), a type of railway and suspended cars/buses in rope (cable cars) as the lasting solution.
He said; “AGT is a modern train with the flexibility to penetrate the nooks and crannies of communities such as markets, residences, offices, seaports, airports, railway stations, hospitals, recreation centres and many more.
“It has the capacity of door-to-door services and can easily serve all the corridors of designed light rails by feeding and taking away passengers to their doorsteps.”
VC speaks
On her part, the university’s Vice-Chancellor, Ibiyemi Olatunji-Bello, said it is currently estimated that about 18 million trips are made daily in the state and about 95 per cent are made on the roads which are overstretched beyond its design capacity.
“The impact of this is the long travel time faced by commuters, who spend a long time waiting for buses that take too long to come, and when they come, they are filled making it difficult for the vulnerable group to enter,” she said.
The professor of Physiology noted that despite laudable efforts by the state, traffic congestion is still one of the major problems facing the people, noting that it could be primarily attributed to the bad driving habits of motorists and other road users.
Also speaking at the event, the wife of the governor of Lagos State, Ibijoke Sanwo-Olu, said the movement of goods and services is central to economic activities for commerce to thrive in any given society.
“Therefore, Lagos as a major economic hub cannot afford to trivialise this important sector. I believe that we all have a role to play in supporting the initiatives of the state government to ensure seamless connectivity and reduce travel time within the state,” the governor’s wife said.