Principal Investigator
Abstract
The rapid increase in the number of vehicles on Kenyan roads has created a major social
problem-the loss of lives through road accidents. According to Renfro (2007) in most cases,
these structures are built in response to user demand for safe crossing where they previously did
not exist. In Kenya, the government provided considerable number of pedestrian’s footbridges on
various major roads so as to ensure safe crossing of pedestrians and to reduce the existing
pedestrian’s vehicular conflicts. The same has been witnessed along ladhis road Muthurwa area
where muthurwa footbridge is located. These accidents can be avoided by providing pedestrian
crossing facilities such as footbridges. Kenya has highest road fatality rates in the world with
average of 7 deaths from the road crashes that occur everyday report on recommendation on
integrated national transport policy (2004).this study was thus done with the objective of
accessing the usability of Muthurwa footbridge its impact on safety and economy. Data was
collected on pedestrian count, pedestrian speed and oral interviews the data was analyzed and the
peak hourly pedestrian volume was 141.it is concluded that the usability of the footbridge is low
many pedestrians shun away from the footbridge due to various reasons such as insecurity, poor
lighting and poor ramp construction. Many proposals were made to improve the footbridge
usability. The footbridge is used by both genders fairly balanced. The footbridge is used by
various age groups and according to the results there was no respondent on the age group 0-15
and above 60 years. The most users of the bridge are age group 17-30. The footbridge was used
by pedestrians of various occupations with the business occupation leading with 60% of the
pedestrians. The study shows that muthurwa footbridge is not fully utilized as intended it is
neglected and most pedestrians prefer using the grade. Due to limited time to conduct the survey
and collection of data the results obtain maybe not be that accurate. Some of the respondents
were not ready to participate in the interview some gave wrong information while others were in
hurry to leave. This research was carried out so that through its findings it would give
information on whether the footbridge was being utilized or not having find out that it is not
utilized the concerned parties should focus on liable projects.