It was so bad. Very bad. The following was what yours sincerely wrote about it, months back. And more:
‘Why do we have this mad love for negativities? Why has government failed all these years to find a solution to the traffic gridlock that has become a killer squeeze on the economy as represented by Apapa and its web of farm-tanks which have made this nation’s vital economic axis difficult to access?
As if the Apapa nuisance is not sufficient heartache, another web of private oil jetties have swung up in Ijegun in Oriade Local Government Development Area of Lagos State, a multi-billion naira project built without consideration for road infrastructure that the tank farms in these jetties need for the right supply and logistics chain.
If anything, the Apapa terrifying burden in the neighbourhood of Ijegun is enough benefit of hindsight to learn from. It is no longer news that Apapa-Wharf/Tin Can Island stretch of the Oshodi-Apapa Motorway has become a no-go-area. Reason? Traffic gridlock.
It has even gone beyond Apapa-Oshodi route. Depending on the part of the mainland you are heading from, you will experience the traffic menace. Long chains of fuel-laden tankers, containers-loaded trucks, now stretch from as far as Folorunso Williams Avenue(former Western Avenue), Orile-Iganmu axis, to Apapa. This means traffic jam to neighbourhoods.
Businesses have moved out of Apapa and neighbourhood and more are still moving out. They are moving out to more suitable places like Surulere, Ilupeju, Gbagada, and sane parts of the Oshodi-Apapa motorway.
It is less business for commercial vehicles. Motorbikes have taken over charging cut-throat prices and commuters and consumers of products moving from one point to the other bear the brunt.
Oriade Local Council Development Area now has to bear the kind of pain; the kind of high risk Apapa community is currently subjected to. Who cares? A multi-billion naira business is established in a residential area – oil depot in a residential area with no consideration for suitable network of roads; with no thought of the risk involved! One may want to ask if any environmental assessment on this huge project was done at all. Who cares?
Originally, passage was to be through Navy Town Road but Navy sensibly said ‘No’, arguing that the Navy Town would be endangered. The owners had recourse to the densely populated Ijegun community and its ramshackle network of roads. The roads are in very serious state of disrepair – strewn with craters that can cause oil-laden tankers to fall over. One would have expected building of a dedicated road for this big business and if not a reconstruction of an existing road – widened concrete pavement road that is suitable for the Ijegun water-logged terrain.
But what is on ground now? An old rickety Marwa Road is home to the Oriade Local Government Development Area Office! Does the local government office care? I do not think so going by the way this arm of government is going about the issue.
Only recently, it shut down operations for a week or thereabout. And guess what it did? It mended just some 30 metres of the several kilometres stretch from the Fin-Niger end of the Marwa Road to the oil depot at Ijegun water front. The road and other adjoining roads like Old Ojo Road and the Lagos-Badagry Express Road under construction by CCCEC whose bridges would soon be encroached upon. You would want to ask if we have learnt anything from the recent Otedola Bridge along Lagos Ibadan Expressway national calamity. Who cares?
If the owners of this big business do no care, and our governors do not care, we care. Nigerians care. Residents of the Oriade community who run a litany of small enterprises in this Lagos mainland area care for their lives and businesses.
They care because they are tax payers too. The small businesses pay annual rates to the local government. Civil servants and others who are in paid employments are hooked on to PAYE whose net they cannot extricate themselves from. Their cars are damaged regularly by the unmotorable Oriade road network; Government must care…’
The Good News
The good news is that the network of roads are being worked on now! This means the message has reached those concerned. Kudos to them. There is currently a commendable level of sanity in the Ijegun business/residential space in question.
There is still much to be done, though: the inner roads – the estate roads, Holy Family/Iya Abiye roads axis, Abiloye/Akin-Joe/Olasanoye/Ijegun Market axis, etc.
We are waiting.
Read the full article here
