Vision Zero: Here’s how to end traffic-related injuries

Dear JMB,

I love reading your column in the Daily Nation and really look forward to it. You have a way with words and obviously know your job. How about using your pedestal and newspaper to promote some road safety ideas and tips?

The DN has a wide and varied reader base and with the popularity of your column, I feel even a tip a week will catch the public especially the younger generation who are the new drivers on the roads. Looking forward to seeing the newspaper today and what you have to offer car-wise!

Have a great week ahead!

Tony W.

Hi Tony,

Allow me to tell you a little story. Once upon a time in 2018 I received an email from the World Health Organisation declaring their recognition of my platform and its usefulness in spreading the gospel of Vision Zero*. They declared that I had earned myself a scholarship courtesy of the New York-based Bloomberg Foundation and should therefore present myself without delay at our local American embassy for visa processing, and in the meantime, here is your air ticket and hotel accommodation at the local Marriott in Baltimore, Maryland, on the eastern seaboard of the Democratic United People’s Kingdom of the Sovereign States of Americanistan.

That is how I found myself landing at Washington Dulles Airport on July 21, 2018. There is a massive rendition of Old Glory on the wall as you enter the airport, to remind you that you are now entering the Land of The Free and Home of the Unwarranted Cavity Search.

Like Ben Carson, I attended Johns Hopkins University, but unlike Ben Carson, I will not go into politics. I graduated a few weeks later as a certified Global Road Safety Leader (complete with a picture on Instagram, which I’m told is how you prove things happened in the digital age) and was tasked - no, beseeched - to go back to my country and save its citizenry from itself with my new-found knowledge and wisdom.

I thus boarded my Qatar Airways flight back home with a hand full of certification and Walmart shopping, a mind overflowing with ideas and a chest bursting with good intentions. I am not Martin Luther King, but I had a dream.

That dream was quickly shattered when I got back here, and for several reasons. The primary reason is Kenyans are the most hardheaded lot you will ever come across. The level of obstinacy is simply astounding. We have perfected the art of the shallow excuse.

A Kenyan will argue vehemently about the driving skill of their eight-year old child but will never admit to the fact that perhaps an eight-year old should not be driving in the first place. Bus passengers will defend their reckless driver overtaking on a sold yellow line and once they run out of (in)valid points, the summary is, “But did you die?”

Yes, we continue to die on the roads, in the thousands annually, because a truck driver will never listen to someone who wasn’t even born yet the year he got his driving license. He knows more than you do, no matter how many aircrafts you have boarded to fly to how many countries to learn from how many experts. He always knows more and you should take your overeducated tail back to wherever it is you hailed from.

And it’s not limited to just the individual. This obstinacy is also institutionalised. I once made an offer to a car company (name withheld) that prides itself in road safety matters and currently enjoys a partnership with the National Transport and Safety Authority (NTSA) to share my knowledge and wisdom and skills as a Johns Hopkins-trained and WHO-certified Global Road Safety Leader as we all work towards achieving Vision Zero and you know what the response was?

“Take your certification back to America. This is Kenya”.

It’s easy for disillusionment to set in where hatred of the truth causes so much distaste that a corporate would stoop to such levels of pettiness just to avoid having to partner with you. It’s easier to just say “no, we’d rather work alone” than to declare non-recognition of WHO/Johns Hopkins certification and yet you claim to be a road safety champion in a country with one of the most gruesome road safety statistics on earth. The irony can be felt all the way in Baltimore.

Obstinacy: that is what is killing us on the roads. Everyone is stubborn and impatient and there are so many self-declared prophets of salvation that the actual experts barely have any room to be heard, and so we continue dying from RTIs (Road Traffic Injuries). The more we keep up with the “Mbele iko sawa” attitude and the more we continue with the “I know more than you, so shut up” pettiness, the worse things will get.

I agree with you fully: This platform would be an excellent venue for a launching pad of a road safety initiative project, but it takes a lot more than advisories to actually see a shift in statistical data towards Vision Zero. A hell of a lot more, and as usual I have a plan, I just need civil** and political*** will for it to materialise. The ball is in NTSA’s court. You all know where and how to reach me (there’s an email address at the bottom of this column).

Glossary

Vision zero: a global agenda whose aim is to attain zero deaths annually from road traffic injuries. Different countries have attained different levels of success in this endeavor, but this also applies to car companies and Volvo prides itself in having the least number of fatalities per vehicle per year.

Civil will: the willingness of the citizenry to embrace social change or accept a proposed agenda.

Political will: the willingness of governments and other relevant authorities to initiate, legislate, regulate and support proposed initiatives or agendas.

 
Halo Baraza, 

I am an ardent follower of yours on matters motoring every Wednesday but I don't seem to recall you giving us your fans anything on Suzuki cars. May I request you to give us a glimpse of Escudos and Vitaras in comparison to other brands? Otherwise keep up the good job you are doing. Many people take your advice seriously as they make decisions on the type of cars to purchase, especially first time buyers.

Ndereba J. M. - Meru

Hi Ndereba,

Escudos and Vitaras are basically the same thing and I have talked about them more than once before. That said, they are some kind of oddballs when compared to other brands, because they straddle two classes in a very strange manner.

They look like and are similarly sized to crossovers (Fozzies, RAVs, CX5s, Outlanders, the lot), but they are not really crossovers. They're SUVs.

From inception (1988) right up to about 2015, the Vitara/Escudo was available with body-on-frame construction, like a Prado, or a lorry, alongside full off-roading gubbins in the form of a transfer case offering selectable 4WD and low range gears.

While the gubbins switched from mechanical to electronic actuation for the fourth generation car, as well as the introduction of a unique "unibody" construction that was nothing but a welded ladder frame, the Escara/Vitudo retained its robustness and status as a cost-friendly and more reliable (if less luxurious) Land Rover. There are places the Escuvitadora can go that few other vehicles can.

The car is generally thirsty because it is a petrol-powered SUV, but not so bad that you'd overlook it as the thinking man's off-roader. And the fact that it straddles two classes of car perfectly - crossover design with SUV capability as opposed to SUV design with crossover capabilities which is the worst of both worlds like some cars I know - makes it a Swiss Army bodkin of some sort.

Until we get to the latest one, from 2015, where pandering to the purchasing power parity of the aspirational housewife puts paid to the purist performance proudly presented by previous models. It is no longer what it used to be. It is a sellout.

The engine is now transversely laid, while previously the placement was longitudinal. 2WD mode means instead of kicking torque from the rear axle like a true enthusiast car should, the new Vitara now claws its way forward on its front paws like a crippled pet. To wrap up this ruined menu is the fetid stench of realisation that if you do not spec your 2015-and-up Vitara properly, you could even wind up with a 1.0 liter three-cylinder engine. What did they do to this car, by Juno?

That said, I haven't tried this car (yet) despite a promise by Toyota Kenya that I would have one shortly after it was launched (along with the Suzuki franchise dealership to compete with CMC) some time back. I'm still waiting. The sales team promises that it will blow my mind. I'm not so sure, though, but there is only one way to find out.

Hi Baraza,

I'm a regular reader of your weekly motor reviews and I kindly request you to enlighten me on Peugeot cars especially 405 as I found one being sold at a very low price and when I did a road test I couldn't find anything out of the ordinary. Please shed some light on the availability of spare parts, fuel consumption and support technology. I don't mind the resale price. 

Hello,

The Peugeot 405, huh? Are you aware I had one? That makes me some sort of self-declared expert.

Spare parts availability: This is a car that came out, what? 35 years ago? That it lasted in production for an entire decade does not give one much hope. That still means the newest of them are what? 25 years old? Supply of model-specific spares may be getting thinner by the year, so brace yourself.

A way out of this it to buy a "parts car", the automotive equivalent of an organ donor, but even this can only go on for so long before your compound is festooned with a plethora of Peugeot shells each missing a specific component and your wife makes good her threats to go back to her father's house where people are more sensible.

Fuel consumption: My 405 has a carburetor engine, so the consumption was terrible. Later models had fuel injection which massively improved the economy figures, so this basically boils down to which model you buy and what state of disrepair it is in.

Support technology: This has been whittled down to "Otis" and "Odhis" and "Omosh" and a variety of other River-Lake Nilotes randomly distributed in small garages in and around urban centers. There is always that one "legend" who will always keep an old Peugeot running, and more often than not he will be from the lakeside. Urysia is currently in charge of the Peugeot brand but they sell contemporary models. It would be quite something presenting for maintenance a vehicle older than the workshop manager.

Resale price: I know you said you don't care, and you shouldn't. Absolutely no one is going to give you good money for an old Peugeot. No one.

That aside, there are a few things about the 405 that I guess are what enamored you to the model. It is a beautiful car, pretty even. 

Designed by Italy's House of Pininfarina, it shares the exact same looks as the Alfa Romeo 164, and if there is one thing we know about Alfas, they're the fashion models of the automotive world. Like the clothes horses, they lack depth and behave hellishly, but by Belisama, are they desperately good to look at...

The 405 is surprisingly roomy. Very roomy, the one I had had a rear boudoir that easily trounces both the BMW E34 and Mercedes-Benz W210 that festoon my fleet. The boot is massive as well, and the engine is torquey. 

This is a car you will enjoy driving until the doors fall off, the electricals go on the fritz and the central locking denies you entry into your own car forcing you to access the interior via the trunk lid, almost getting you lynched when passers-by suspect you are trying to TWOC* the vehicle and you have to talk very fast explaining that you are in fact the owner and you have the car keys in your hand, they just don't work any more.
I will not miss that car.

Glossary: *TWOC: Taking Without Owner's Consent