Passengers on the up-coming Nairobi-Mombasa railway will pay a concessional fee priced at half the fare being charged by buses, says Transport and Infrastructure Cabinet Secretary James Macharia.
He said passengers will enjoy a six-month offer during which there will be two train services plying the standard gauge railway – one to Nairobi and another to Mombasa – to help gauge the demand for passengers. The new train launches on May 31.
A final report on the passenger and cargo tariffs will be out in a week, the minister said.
This means economy travellers on the high-speed train will pay between Sh500 and Sh800; being half what buses charge for the journey between the capital and the seaside port of Mombasa.
“The cost will be half of what the buses are currently charging,” Mr Macharia told the Sunday Nation. “Various teams are working on the details,” he added.
President Uhuru Kenyatta will take a symbolic ride on May 31 aboard the high-speed train ahead of celebrations to mark Madaraka Day on June 1, when Kenya attained self-internal rule from Britain.
Kenya has already procured 40 passenger coaches, each with a capacity of 118 travellers, for the economy class, 72 people in the business class, and 44 in the first-class section.
The Transport minister said the government is banking on speed, reliability and pricing of the new railcars to attract passengers who use buses and budget airlines.
The SGR passenger trains will run at an average speed of 120km per hour, cutting the time between Nairobi and Mombasa to about five hours from the current nine-hour journey by buses and 12 hours by rail. http://mobile.nation.co.ke/business/New-standard-gauge-train-to-cut-travel-cost-by-half/1950106-3916504-e7whb0z/index.html
Are we all travelling to mombasa?
Is the return of investment worth the billions pumped to it ?
Returns will be for chinaman to recoup their loan.
Mimi niko ndaaaaani…kila mwezi nikuenda Mambasani…
Mombasa twasija, kila weekend@TLS
Ndugu yangu okwonko ile fare they will be collecting will it pay off the billions borrowed from china?kenya isn’t an industrialized country to export stuff na reli nje,instead we import massively hadi toothpicks
wewe, unasahau kuna cargo to be ferried to and from the Port of MSA, hapo ndio pesa iko. passenger service is just a by-product of SGR.
The rail is for the use of Chinese Government and its people to pump substandard goods they are known for into East Africa. Or does anybody want to argue that most of the goods wont be Chinese imports.
Yeah…and the reason they need not charge alot, factorin in economies of scale…yaani fare iwe reasonable with majority takin it as a favourable option
Doesnt matter…so long as some of those industries ama companies eventually have a subsidiary in kenya…na btw kuna quality stuff from china, wengi ndio hupenda izo sub standard affordable stuff
Wacha nitaona how the math will play out
Hatupendi substandard. Its the only crap in the local market btw. We need some control and investment into ourselves. Britons built their own railway so they could dryfry us. We have built the Chinese one at a price we can hardly afford.
It was explained so clearly na tukaombwa, tuchukulie hii SGR kama a catalyst for development. We should not regard it as a business venture. It is like how you sink millions of shillings and build a bungalow at home knowing all too well that it’s an invaluable venture from which you don’t expect monetary returns!
Some guys are generally slow. They are at the forefront condemning something yet they haven’t taken time to understand/analyse it.
But again, Babuoun akisema ni mbaya, no proof is needed.
Cool…but im talking small scale import stuff…gadgets likes etc where we have high end vs budget
And why do we import from china?
because even the government and leadership is convinced that we can never make anything for ourselves and we an only afford chinese junk. Almost irredeemable.
i digress but average speed of 120km, is impossible for those trains, after 6 months what will be the cost?
What do you make yourself bwana sirkal?