China Railway and Bridge Corporation will complete works on Mombasa – Nairobi line, and plans to launch test trials in March. The Ministry of Transport has announced that “test rides on the standard gauge railway will start next month to ensure optimum performance once full operations begin in June.”
The construction works on 472-km line are 99 per cent completed and all the needed facilities will be finalised after testing process.
The Kenya Railways Corporation has so far received 8 freight haulage heavy-duty locomotives for mainline use out of the expected 43, and two shunting locomotives out of 8 ordered for the SGR. Recently, CRRC delivered 60 wagons in the first batch of 1,620 freight haulage rolling stock and two more passenger coaches are expected by May.
The SGR will connect Kenya, Uganda, Rwanda and South and in Kenya, the railway starts in the port city of Mombasa, crossing the North Corridor, through Nairobi, Kisumu to Malaba.
Works to the Mombasa –Malaba railway project, implemented in two phases, were launched at the end of 2014. The first phase involved the construction of the first section, Mombasa-Nairobi railway which is developed by China Road and Bridge Corporation as part of two contracts. The commercial contract includes the development of civil engineering works, while the second contract includes the delivery and installation of facilities, as well as the delivery of 56 locomotives, 40 passenger cars and 1620 freight cars.
The total cost of the Mombasa-Nairobi railway is USD 3.24 billion of which the EXIM Bank of China has covered 90% of costs (USD 2.9 billion), while the government 10% (USD 324 million).
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