Kampala Capital City Authority (KCCA) Executive Director Dorothy Kisaka has asked taxi operators in Old Taxi Park to find ways on how they can work together within the newly issued regulations by the Authority.
Kisaka who was addressing journalists on Tuesday at City Hall said that the Old Taxi Park has been renovated but if wrangles between the authority, taxi operators and within themselves are not settled it will be very hard to develop businesswise.
Her call for harmony follows the authority’s move to issue new route chart for taxis that are going to operate in the newly renovated Old Taxi Park.
Since the old route chart which was issued last year with the help of the Ministry of Works and Transport was temporary and expired in December 2020, On Tuesday KCCA issued a new chart route.
The chart which has been unveiled to taxi operators has a total of 27 stages and taxis will use these routes along Jinja Road, Bombo Road and Kibuli Road.
Among the 27 stages include; Ntinda-Nakawa which exit the Park through Burton Street, Gayaza stage, Mpererwe, Kawempe, Bwaise, Kulambiro and Namugongo stage whose taxis are supposed to exit the Park through Ben Kiwanuka Street, Kayunga-Bugerere and Mulago-Nsooba-Kitala-Taso stages which shall exit through Mackay Road.
Others include: Jinja, Busia, Luzira, Bukasa, Bweyogerere and Mukono.
Taxis heading to the Entebbe Road which had been moved to Usafi shall not return to the Old Taxi Park.
According to Kisaka, the Old Taxi Park will be reopened on May 22nd however, she urged that there must be harmonization in the governance of the park amidst the many associations all claiming to be the unifying bodies for the operators.
“If Governance of the park is not sorted at this stage, there will be a lot of conflicts that is why as the authority, currently, our emphasis is to see that we don’t go back into old wrangles because there are many associations each claiming power. Therefore, there is a need to keep a close working relationship with stakeholders to ensure that the Park is well managed, government policies like taxes are respected and that there is order in the City,” she said.
Mustafa Mayambala, the Chairman of Uganda Transport Development Agency- UTRADA welcomed the idea of the new chart. However, he said that some of the stages have been duplicated.
“There are three Mukono stages all going through Bweyogere, Namanve and Seeta, this is likely to cause conflict on these stages as operators struggle for passengers. Putting that aside, we welcome the Authority’s idea and we have to form a committee that shall work with the authority to streamline issues of Park management, ” Said Mayambala.
Taxi operators also want KCCA to remove all taxis operating in non-gazetted areas like streets. They allude that some taxis operate in the park while others are left to wait for passengers on the streets something that puts taxis in the parks at a disadvantage.
Meanwhile, the renovated Old Taxi park will accommodate only 344 out of the 450 that were previously there. This still raises a lot of questions where the rest of the taxis will park as they wait to access the Park.
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