Lessons from failed Nairobi traffic experiment

In the past week I keenly watched the Nairobi Governor’s experiment with roundabouts in the city. From what I gather the Governor and his team came up with the idea that eliminating roundabouts would ease the flow of traffic thereby saving Nairobians some valuable time.

However, as it turned out the experiment failed. Instead, the drums will leave the roundabouts and we should expect to have four-way intersections instead of roundabouts in the next few months. Now, there are several lessons from this failed experiment. First, did the Governor’s team collect data on road usage in the city? Did they collect information on how this varies by time of day and what patterns the distribution of vehicles follow? Did this data then inform the decision to get rid of the roundabouts?

These questions are important because they get to the idea of policy-making. For decades we were used to roadside policy pronouncements from our leaders without much thought, leave alone research.

The culture of roadside pronouncements is gone. But we are yet to embrace the idea of using research and data analysis in the process of designing, implementing and evaluating public policy.

Our police probably do not collect systematic data on crime rates by location. They merely respond. And even then do not bother to evaluate whether the strategies of responding to crime makes a difference. It is all done on the fly.

The same can be said for several other Ministries. Judging by recent ministerial pronouncements regarding public policy in important departments like Agriculture, Education and Health, it is clear that these Cabinet Secretaries do not take time to collect information and process it properly before arriving at specific policies.

How many bags of maize did we produce as a country last year? And by how much does the price of maize fluctuate for each additional one thousands bags of maize produced? Should we not be planning ahead for the maize harvest instead of always reacting to it?

In the same vein, the ministry of Education recently announced that it plans to introduce instruction of Mandarin in all our schools. Now, in principle, there is nothing wrong with such a move. China has more than a billion people and will soon be the biggest economy in the world. But how will introduction of Mandarin affect learning in our schools? And is this really worth it, given that the Chinese already speak English?

The job of Cabinet Secretaries is not just to launch programmes and fly from one meeting to the next. They are supposed to do policy wonks; and are supposed to surround themselves with the right people.

This was the whole point of locking politicians from these positions. Unfortunately, the new Cabinet Secretaries are not different from the ministers of pre-devolution years. We can conclude they love to cut ribbons, but do not care to do their homework given the policy pronouncements we hear from them. Many have not realised that Kenya is fast growing and as such needs smart policies to match.

Going back to the Nairobi experiment, a few things might have helped the team. First, they should have collected the appropriate data and then come up with a model of traffic flow in the city.

Second, they should have then come up with specific ideas about how to ease traffic, given the data. Third, before hoisting their plan on Nairobians, they should have piloted their proposed policies. Information so obtained would have helped fine-tune the specific interventions they had in mind, or scrap them altogether.

The idea of learning through experiment should inform our overall national policy development. We have 47 laboratories in the name of counties that can be useful sites for policy experimentation. This is not a crazy idea.

Kenya already hosts dozens of social science experiments run by foreign aid agencies. The findings of these experiments that present potential opportunities for our governments rarely make it to our government boardrooms.

But taking advantage of such opportunities requires a singular dedication to one’s job. It requires follow up and constant monitoring after cutting ribbons. It requires a genuine interest in the specific issue areas one’s department covers. Which raises the question, do we hire the right people for success?