Families told to vacate to facilitate SGR project completion

Families paid millions of shillings in five counties to facilitate construction of the 120-kilometre Nairobi-Naivasha Standard Gauge Railway (SGR) line must vacate to facilitate the project’s completion.

Kenya Railways acting managing director Philip Mainga said the contractor was keen to take possession of the parcels of land to continue with construction of the Sh150 billion project set for commissioning on May 31, 2019.

Mr Mainga said all compensatory details for the affected 1,810 families in Nairobi, Kiambu, Kajiado, Nakuru and Narok counties had been completed and payments made since last October.

“We are keen to extend the Madaraka Express Passenger and Freight Services to Suswa upon completion of Phase 2A, which requires that affected families co-operate and allow the contractor to take over the land,” he said in a newspaper advert.

The project ran into trouble after affected families vowed to stay put claiming to have been underpaid and others had their names omitted in the payments list.

But National Land Commission (NLC) denied the claims saying payments had been stopped after it was discovered some parcels’ payments had been exaggerated.

Acting NLC chairman Abigael Mukolwe said this saw earlier payment amounts reduced to Sh7.4 billion but declined to disclose the formerly inflated amounts.

China Communications Construction Company, which is building 120 kilometres of rail lines over a tough Rift Valley terrain, is using the hanging basket technique to overcome the topography challenges.

According to CCCC’s public relations assistant manager Jasper Liu, the hanging basket method – which is popular among Chinese bridge builders – has been found to be the best option for the terrain when compared with other bridge construction techniques.

Incredible scenery and incredible dangers are both facing Chinese engineers as they implement the Nairobi-Naivasha standard gauge railway (SGR) – touted as Kenya’s most challenging railway project.

China Communications Construction Company, which is building 120 kilometres of rail lines over a tough Rift Valley terrain, is using the hanging basket technique to overcome the topography challenges.

According to CCCC’s public relations assistant manager Jasper Liu, the hanging basket method – which is popular among Chinese bridge builders – has been found to be the best option for the terrain when compared with other bridge construction techniques.

“In bridge construction, the hanging basket is a very important construction tool. The components include the hanging system, travelling system, bearing structure, anchor unit and operation platform,” Mr Liu said on Tuesday during a media tour of the project.

The hanging basket is basically a structure that is able to move along the top of the girder, anchored on the already completed pillar and the method is used to pour concrete symmetrically from two ends of a bridge to their respective middle span at the same time.

The Sh150 billion railway will go over cliffs and into four tunnels covering 7.756 kilometres tunneled through Ngong Hills.

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