Currently, 28 out of the 84 buses that the government imported for the operation of the Bus Rapid Transit (BRT) are shuttling the Amasaman and Tudu stretch of the road daily as part of measures to ease traffic congestion, as well as ensure convenience for commuters and workers along that stretch.

Purpose of QBS

The Public Affairs Manager of the Greater Accra Passenger Transport Executive (GAPTE), managers of the QBS, Mr Fred Chidi, disclosed this to the Daily Graphic in an interview in Accra yesterday.

Explaining the purpose of the QBS, he said it was introduced to bring convenience to workers who lived around the Amasaman areas and usually had to travel to the Central Business District (CBD) in Accra to work.

“We found out that workers usually spend two hours or more in traffic before they reach their various destinations, and that affects productivity largely,” he said.

“The main essence of the BRT system is to develop into a ‘park and ride’ system in the near future where private car owners will be made to park at certain points and join public transport in order to ease traffic on the major roads. But that is for the long term, and the BRT is geared towards that angle,” the manager added.

Implementation

Even though the GAPTE promised a full-scale implementation of the BRT would take effect in November this year, Mr Chidi said that could not happen.

He, however, could not give particular timelines for the full implementation, noting that before such implementation could be achieved, there ought to be dedicated lanes from take-off to destination, which Mr. Chidi said would take some time.

“We’re currently implementing type one of the BRT and that is the QBS or the Aayalolo bus system. For a full-blown BRT, there should be dedicated lanes from origin to destination,” he added.

Mr Chidi also gave an assurance that plans had been put in place to roll out the system on the Adentan-Tudu route as well as Kasoa to the CBD to ease traffic on those stretches of roads.

Interventions

According to Mr Chidi, the new buses came with certain features that were unique and would also help passengers reach their destinations safely and conveniently earlier than previously.

He mentioned one of the features to include cue jumpers that were embossed on the buses to communicate with traffic lights by way of avoiding traffic whenever the buses reached intersections.

“These cue jumpers communicate with the traffic light by switching to green and allowing the buses only to pass whenever they reach places where there are traffic lights,” the manager stated.

On the ‘park and ride’ system, Mr Chidi said the public would be educated on its benefits.

Background

The BRT is under the Urban Transport Project (UTP) of the Ministry of Roads and Highways. It is jointly funded by the World Bank, Agence Francaise de Development (AFD), the Government of Ghana and the Global Environment Facility Trust Fund at a cost of $95 million. It is being implemented by the Ministries of Local Government and Rural Development, Roads and Highways and the DUR.

Processes towards the implementation of the BRT were started in 2007. However, between 2008 and 2009, it faced many difficulties, including stiff resistance from private transport operators.

Earlier, the DUR planned implementing an advanced type of BRT on the Accra-Mallam-Kasoa corridor.

That move resulted in the construction of a flyover across the railway line on the Graphic Road in Accra.