Tanzania’s BRT fleet jumps to 210 vehicles

Rapid transit bus in Dar es Salaam, Tanzania. The number of vehicles in Tanzania's Bus Rapid Transit system has increased to 210 from the 70 it had last year.

The number of vehicles in Tanzania's Bus Rapid Transit system has increased to 210 from the 70 it had last year, enabling the increase of the number of routes the buses ply.

In 2021, the multibillion-shilling Dar es Salaam Bus Rapid Transit (BRT) project received a major boost after the government released 70 buses held at the Dar es Salaam Port.

Since their importation in 2018, the buses remained stranded at port over what was described as miscommunication between the government and the Usafiri Dar es Salaam-Rapid Transit (Uda-RT).

The $151 million vehicles were released by Dar es Salaam Regional Commissioner Amos Makalla who allowed the 70 vehicles to start operations to ease commuter transportation nightmares on the 21.1 kilometres BRT network by the UDA-RT.

Dar Rapid Transit Agency (Dart) Public Relations manager William Gatambi said that the number of buses plying the BRT infrastructure have now increased to 210.

“This has enabled BRT to introduce four new feeder routes compared to the past when we had two. The new feeder routes are the Kibaha-Kimara, Mlonganzila-Kimara and Magufuli-Kimara, Mwenge via Morocco,” he said, adding that the Gerezani-Muhimbili and Kimara-Mbezi are the old routes.

This article originally appeared on The East Africa