Addresing public concerns
Maya-Kamengo stretch has become a death trapThe New Vision, Tuesday, March 5, 2013, Page 13Kampala-Masaka Highway between Maya and Kamengo is progressively narrowing and getting dangerous every other day, with an average of four accidents daily! It is narrow, potholed and the sides are eroded. There are gullies along some stretches making the road very risky to use.Who is directly responsible for this road?Tony Bukenya from Katende
UNRA ResponseKampala-Masaka road is under reconstruction. The reconstruction of the Kampala – Nsangi and Kamengo-Lukaya (63km) was completed in July 2012. Works on Nsangi-Kamengo and Lukaya-Masaka sections are ongoing and 10km out of 51 have been completed. Maintenance works are also carried out on this road in order to keep it in a good motorable condition during the reconstruction period.Physical works involve reconstruction and widening of the entire road to 11m carriageway road including shoulders, realigning of bends, constructing of climbing lanes, parking lanes, bus bays and junctions, and installation of new road signs and marking.

UNRA should be more seriousThe Observer, Monday, February 18-19, 2013, Page 8It has been known for a long while that Entebbe road would be expanded. The same is true of the Kampala-Malaba/Busia highway. Why then has UNRA casually watched over the years as new buildings popped up on what should have been reserved for future roads? Do they really believe that it will cost them less that way?Some seriousness ought to be exercised by the powers that be in matters of national interest!Paget Kintu
UNRA ResponseUNRA started operation in July 2008 and inherited a number of problems on our roads including encroachment on the road reserves.UNRA has started the process of reclaiming road reserves for future expansion of roads.The new road reserves are being marked using concrete markers and the public is being sensitized to vacate marked reserves.

When will work on roads marked for repair/construction start?
Daily Monitor, February 6, 2013, Page 12For a number of years, Mpigi via Kinoni through Ssembabule road has been indicated in budget readings as one of those roads to be tarmacked.In fact at one time, President Museveni went and commissioned the beginning of the work on this road. Sadly, the repairs have still not yet taken off.This is the same case with a number of roads in different parts of the country.Leonard Kakinda
UNRA ResponseIt is not true that President Museveni commissioned works for upgrading of Mpigi-Maddu –Ssembabule to tarmac. What is true is that this road has been on our programme for upgrading to tarmac for the last three financial years. UNRA carried out the design and procured a contractor but unfortunately due to budget constraints, government could not raise the necessary funds for this project. The road is now under procurement through Contractor Facilitated Financing (contractors will raise the required funds) and upgrading works are expected to commence in FY 2013/14.
Fix black spots on roadsDaily Monitor, February 1, 2013, Page 11 There are many known black spots on various roads in Uganda where accidents commonly occur.Why doesn’t government do something about them? Find out why accidents keep occurring in those spots without a solution being found to the problem. We should not simply sit back and watch while accidents re-occur in the same places.Jackie Mugabi
UNRA ResponseIt is true that a number of black spots have been identified on our roads and UNRA with the help of partners has improved some of these spots. A number of black spots have been improved on Kampala-Jinja Highway with the assistance of the World Bank. Black spots on Kampala-Masaka-Mbarara roads have been removed under the ongoing reconstruction of this road with support of the European Union. Other roads where black spots have been improved include Kampala-Mityana and Jinja-Bugiri.
State of Kihihi-Kanungu road hurts UWA tooNew Vision, Monday, January 14, 2013, Page 19 Uganda wildlife Authority have fervently sought the assistance of our sister agency UNRA for the last several months to have the road rehabilitated and we believe that something will soon be done about it.By Lillian NsubugaPublic Relations ManagerUganda wildlife Authority
UNRA Response:This road is currently undergoing periodic maintenance and it is one of the roads earmarked for tarmacking under Contractor Facilitated Financing starting 2014.
UNRA Road SlabsSunday Monitor, January 6, 2013, Page 25 Newly resurfaced roads like Kabale-Kisoro, Karuma- Arua, and Kampala-Masindi have concrete slabs a few feet from the road with UNRA written on them. I am told they cost more than UShs2million each! If it is true they cost that much, the road from Kampala to Arua requires more than 5,000 slabs on each side which amounts to 10,000 slabs and UShs10bn.Federica Nshemereirwe
UNRA ResponseThe concrete slabs mentioned by the writer are ‘Road Reserve Markers’. They are not ‘wastage’ because they are purposely installed to protect land acquired by UNRA for not only future road expansion but also for road safety. Acquisition of land for infrastructure development is becoming more and more expensive, leading to delays of road projects; future acquisition of land is projected to cost more than the actual physical construction of roads.We must protect the land already paid for by UNRA. The Road Reserve Markers are not expensive as alleged by the writer and do not cost anything near UShs2m
Dan AlinangeHead, Corporate CommunicationsUganda National Roads Authority

Culverts, end structures and stream channels have been installed and the swamps cleared to ensure enhanced drainages and the roads reinstated

“We always have a roads network-maintenance work-plan, which always has resources that UNRA Headquarters release every quarter. In the event of emergencies, Hoima UNRA Station communicates with its supervisors at Headquarters and with them, works out a re-allotment of the resources within the existing work-plan’s existing envelop and then accordingly address the developments within those confines’’.Thus, Lukungu Hussein, an Assistant Engineer for Force Account Operations at Hoima UNRA Station sums up the approach to the emergency operations that have been critical to keeping the station’s network open.Over the last 18months of unprecedented heavy rains and floods, Kitumbi River washed away a stretch of about 500m at km23 along Masodde-Ntwentwe-Nkoko-Nalweyo Road; a stretch of 700m was washed out of Nsunga-Bugwara-Kikwaya Road at Ruzaire and 500m was washed out of Kibale-Kyebando-Pachwa Road at another location also called Ruzaire.Further, the Station’s Force Account has just responded to an emergency along Kataire-Bugambi-Mairye Road where severe erosion warranted the restoration of culverts and erection of protective gabions.Eng Lukungu elaborates that, “The Station’s Force Account has installed drainage structures; the culverts, end-structures and stream channels and cleared the swamps vegetation to ensure enhanced drainages and also reinstated the roads. Interventions include spot gravelling and raising the affected, initially low-lying hence vulnerable sections to flooding through the swamps.”He says the strategy to preclude or mitigate the gravity of emergencies is to make drainage improvements, particularly along the potentially hazardous sections before the onset of the rains—the bottlenecks have already been addressed.Lukungu proposes that to improve the handling of future emergencies, it is urgent to equip the Force Account Unit with the right equipment for effective swamp and channel clearing—the excavators and tractor loaders that are easy to truck and maneuver; “We may not be having enough money, but such equipment would go a long way in speeding up the interventions.”

UNRA has in the last five years upgraded and also rehabilitated over 500km of roads; now in innovative funding options in the face of financing shortages

In 1988 a road formation unit had been set up to primarily manage the road sector development programs and establish work systems that assisted UNRA when it was set up in 2008, hence a good start.A young organization, UNRA has been tasked with a very big responsibility and faced with many challenges it has embraced with the help of preparations made before UNRA it was set up. Initially, UNRA’s biggest challenge was the road maintenance function it took over from the Ministry of Works and Transport—but on the whole at 5years’ age and having the capability to absorb over US$500mn annually, UNRA’s absorption capacity is the largest among government’s agencies; its capacity is only limited by funding availability.UNRA’s Director for Planning, Eng David Luyimbazi notes that with World Bank, the European Union and Government of Uganda support, UNRA has over the last five years implemented a large development programme entailing the upgrading of over 500km of roads and separately rehabilitating a similar distance; “We now have a shortage of financing options, hence the adoption of contractor financed projects that the WB is adopting.”He argues that the next Country Assistance Strategy will have fewer large transformative projects, as UNRA moves towards performance based contracts that focus on major export corridors like Tororo- Mbale-Soroti-Lira-Gulu-Atiak- Nimule that must be open to sustain trade between Uganda, Kenya and Southern Sudan.Corridors like Kampala-Kawempe-Luwero-Kafu, Karuma, Kamdin Corner-Gulu, and Kampala-Masaka-Mbarara-Katuna must be kept open, hence UNRA’s plan to implement performance-based contracts under which a contractor looks after the corridor over a ten-year period. Paid bi-annually to maintain, operate and improve the corridor as desired, he must thus achieve particular performance levels; keep the corridor open, ensuring the certainty of journey times, hence no broken bridges, dust or potholes to guarantee the country its competitiveness in the region.UNRA has lived to the expectations put before it, reflected in designing and preparing more roads projects for implementation (than the government can fund), some of the programmes picked by the European Union, African Development Bank and the World Bank have been designed and prepared with government of Uganda funding.Eng Luyimbazi opines that the World Bank Partnership with Uganda’s road sector through UNRA is only growing stronger and with the existing institutional set-up, UNRA is looking forward to larger programmes to improve World Bank and Road Sector visibility, hence the focus on the transformative projects for the benefit of the population in a more significant fashion through major transport corridors.

Residents have hitherto viewed roads with a callous detachment as belonging to the government

 Hoima UNRA Station has on February 28, 2013 conducted a Road Committee workshop at Kiziranfumbi Sub-county. According to the Station Manager, Eng Jonathan Wazimbe, the workshop brought together LC1 Chairpersons from the Sub-country whose jurisdiction localities border Hoima-Kagadi-Fort Portal Road.Themed, ‘Community Ownership of Roads’, the workshop that the LC3 Chairman Mr Francis Bwesige attended, was facilitated by UNRA’s Consultant on community participation in roads maintenance, Mr Muhammad Kagere.It was expected that the workshop outcomes would be passed down to residents who have hitherto viewed roads with a callous detachment as belonging to the government, hence whose state of repair was not of concern to them.Among other subjects, participants were informed of the roles and responsibilities expected of road committees, the particular roads under UNRA’s jurisdiction, the benefits of good roads and the essence of road reserves and their importance.They were advised on road safety and the essential nature of road furniture, the critical nature of environmental issues in relation to road maintenance programmes, employment opportunities available at UNRA and the procurement procedures of UNRA’s transactions.