Spaghetti nears Completion

Pini Bothoko | Friday December 23, 2016 12:36

 

It would be an injustice to end the year without writing something about the Thapama Interchange, popularly known as the ‘Spaghetti road’ in the roads engineering lingua franca.

The Spaghetti Road would be completed next year February, according the Ministry of Transport of Communications.

Construction of the Spaghetti Road started in 2015 and numerous delays in completing the road has irked the city leadership, motorists and other stakeholders in equal measure.

When delivering the state of the nation address recently, President Ian Khama said there has been measurable progress in the completion of mega projects, giving examples of the Tonota-Francistown Road and the Thapama interchange junction.

Khama stated that the Thapama interchange is anticipated to be complete by February 2017.

The project was awarded to China Railways Seventh Group in 2015 and was supposed to have been completed in August 2016 but residents of Francistown were forced to wait as it was postponed to October, then to February 2017.

The Francistown Spaghetti junction is part of the 30km Tonota-Francistown dual road project at a cost of P121 million.

Since its construction, the ‘Spaghetti junction’ has caused unbearable traffic congestions in the city, particularly during peak hours, leading to poor performance of businesses.

The junction links with the majority of internal roads ,hence its delay has affected the movement of cars in the entire city.

Some public transport operators here are concerned that the delay has greatly inconvenienced their businesses as they are now making losses.

The delay is a concern, even to some businesses that are now impatient with the tardiness of contractors, as they had anticipated the road to ease traffic flow and help attract potential customers to their businesses.

However, this week, the junction was temporarily opened for public use this festive season for three weeks, and has given public transport operators hope for better profits.

Being the first of its kind in Botswana the ‘Spaghetti road’ is expected to give the city a facelift.