Looking at Nairobi to Mombasa as an example, it looks like Nairobi to Kyumvi and Makindu to Mombasa could be designed and built as high speed rail as the terrain looks relatively flat.
However, there is a set of hills between Kyumvi and Makindu that will make the geometry of the rail a lot trickier. The cost of viaducts and tunneling through those hills could be significantly more costly than the rest of the project combined. For the expensive part of the rail, it may be better to build that part at a lower design speed that can get upgraded later.
China built a great high speed rail system, but a lot of people in China still use the traditional rail system due to ticket cost, and the population in China is wealthier than the average African. You also have the African rail system being designed to operate with freight, which is something that the Chinese high speed rail network wasn’t really designed to handle as much of.
The economics don’t seem to favor high speed rail now, so it may be better to design the system so that it doesn’t preclude high speed rail in the future.
African countries are currently negotiating loan agreements with countries such as China while avoiding Western interests as well as the International Monetary Fund (IMF) and World Bank.
China has a history of offering aggressive upfront costs on loans in exchange for a lot of influence in the region. So I’m guessing China gave the AU a sweetheart deal in exchange for cutting out competitors and potentially allowing China a lot of lenience in future investments (e.g. sweatshops and unsafe mines).
So here’s what I see the strategy as:
give the AU a very expensive loan with an initial deferment; the leadership of the AU is happy because they can show the public that they’re doing something
some years down the line, the AU realizes it can’t actually pay the debt, and arranges further deals with China that increases China’s influence in the area
repeat 2 until Africa has been bled dry just as much as with European colonial powers
I don’t see this as a real long-term solution. Instead of trying to connect every African country, they should pick favorites at first, with a contract with member countries to eventually expand to everyone. As in, connect the most prosperous areas that will absolutely use the rail network, and expand once that cash flows, and do so without massive loans from countries with an economic interest in exploiting the area.
I just don’t see China’s interests aligning with the EU. This just seems likely to have heavy corruption where the AU gets short term benefits for a long term sellout of the AU to China.
The initial set of plans looks like a very high level program design, which is appropriate for this stage of planning. It is also going to be up to the constituent member nations to get this built, which is consistent with a continental system that is being planned.
This is a good beginning to a long term solution, but the costs may outweigh the benefits in the short and medium terms.
I hope that the first segments chosen are those that add the most value immediately, then expansions radiate from there so that the incomplete segments are still valuable in their smaller parts. Since they are defining technology now, the different parts should integrate easily into one large system.
My concern with picking China is that Chinese engineers are likely going to go with the expensive option no matter what; they’ve done it in China a lot and I don’t see them changing.
The summary isn’t detailed to go through how the system gets implemented. I also noted in another comment that it is would be wise to design the geometry of some segments to high speed rail standards if the cost increase due to tighter geometry requirements are negligible.
A continental high speed rail network is a great goal, but there are ways to implement the system that can yield faster benefits to Africans than just building the whole system to high speed standards at once.
Again, I have no idea why you’re assuming these countries haven’t done due diligence before embarking on a megaproject like this. A really weird premise to start from to be honest.
I’m assuming the same due diligence my country puts into these kinds of projects. Hell, there are large parts of the Internet that critique projects like this in general, no matter who builds it.
If I’m willing to critique developed countries in infrastructure projects, why shouldn’t do the same for developing countries?
If you wanted to make a serious critique then you should spend the time to actually learn about the project and criticize specifics instead of just making stuff up based on what your country does.
And my critique is based on the experience of Chinese High Speed Rail, which I noted in other comment. All you did was ask me by what right I can critique them, and I responded that I will critique any of these types of plans, including plans in my country.
Why are you saying I’m being defensive when I’m simply pointing out that what you’re saying is unsubstantiated, and it’s not really possible to have a meaningful discussion without knowing the actual details of the plan. If there’s something specific you want to criticize then that would be an interesting discussion, but simply claiming high speed rail is a bad idea because reasons is just noise.
This post doesn’t have that detail. I’m only critiquing the project based on the information at hand which you provided. If there is noise, it is because the resolution of the plan as detailed is allow you are going to only get noise as part of the discussion. I don’t know if the planning has been gotten to my discussion points yet.
You had also said several times asking if I thought the African economists did their jobs competently. It sounds like an appeal to authority to not talk about what is known. I’m looking at this project as being planned by experts and I haven’t said anything to suggest otherwise. However, people can still critique experts.
Because high speed rail requires costly viaducts that can make the project cost several times the price of a lower speed line.
I think the benefits of going high speed rail now would outweigh the negatives of upgrading at a later point.
It depends on the cost/benefit ratio.
Looking at Nairobi to Mombasa as an example, it looks like Nairobi to Kyumvi and Makindu to Mombasa could be designed and built as high speed rail as the terrain looks relatively flat.
However, there is a set of hills between Kyumvi and Makindu that will make the geometry of the rail a lot trickier. The cost of viaducts and tunneling through those hills could be significantly more costly than the rest of the project combined. For the expensive part of the rail, it may be better to build that part at a lower design speed that can get upgraded later.
China built a great high speed rail system, but a lot of people in China still use the traditional rail system due to ticket cost, and the population in China is wealthier than the average African. You also have the African rail system being designed to operate with freight, which is something that the Chinese high speed rail network wasn’t really designed to handle as much of.
The economics don’t seem to favor high speed rail now, so it may be better to design the system so that it doesn’t preclude high speed rail in the future.
My main concern here is this:
China has a history of offering aggressive upfront costs on loans in exchange for a lot of influence in the region. So I’m guessing China gave the AU a sweetheart deal in exchange for cutting out competitors and potentially allowing China a lot of lenience in future investments (e.g. sweatshops and unsafe mines).
So here’s what I see the strategy as:
I don’t see this as a real long-term solution. Instead of trying to connect every African country, they should pick favorites at first, with a contract with member countries to eventually expand to everyone. As in, connect the most prosperous areas that will absolutely use the rail network, and expand once that cash flows, and do so without massive loans from countries with an economic interest in exploiting the area.
I just don’t see China’s interests aligning with the EU. This just seems likely to have heavy corruption where the AU gets short term benefits for a long term sellout of the AU to China.
The initial set of plans looks like a very high level program design, which is appropriate for this stage of planning. It is also going to be up to the constituent member nations to get this built, which is consistent with a continental system that is being planned.
This is a good beginning to a long term solution, but the costs may outweigh the benefits in the short and medium terms.
I hope that the first segments chosen are those that add the most value immediately, then expansions radiate from there so that the incomplete segments are still valuable in their smaller parts. Since they are defining technology now, the different parts should integrate easily into one large system.
My concern with picking China is that Chinese engineers are likely going to go with the expensive option no matter what; they’ve done it in China a lot and I don’t see them changing.
I’m going to go out on a limb and guess that the actual economists in Africa have done the math here.
The summary isn’t detailed to go through how the system gets implemented. I also noted in another comment that it is would be wise to design the geometry of some segments to high speed rail standards if the cost increase due to tighter geometry requirements are negligible.
A continental high speed rail network is a great goal, but there are ways to implement the system that can yield faster benefits to Africans than just building the whole system to high speed standards at once.
Again, I have no idea why you’re assuming these countries haven’t done due diligence before embarking on a megaproject like this. A really weird premise to start from to be honest.
I’m assuming the same due diligence my country puts into these kinds of projects. Hell, there are large parts of the Internet that critique projects like this in general, no matter who builds it.
If I’m willing to critique developed countries in infrastructure projects, why shouldn’t do the same for developing countries?
Hell, it isn’t like they have to listen to me.
If you wanted to make a serious critique then you should spend the time to actually learn about the project and criticize specifics instead of just making stuff up based on what your country does.
Why so defensive?
And my critique is based on the experience of Chinese High Speed Rail, which I noted in other comment. All you did was ask me by what right I can critique them, and I responded that I will critique any of these types of plans, including plans in my country.
It’s a troll move. Make you do hours of work, you post, they do a new low-effort post and expect you to dance all over again.
Because if you won’t, you’re clearly avoiding the topic.
Flip the script and ask them to post, but sometimes you learn there’s another angle than you’ve been told. Sometimes.
Why are you saying I’m being defensive when I’m simply pointing out that what you’re saying is unsubstantiated, and it’s not really possible to have a meaningful discussion without knowing the actual details of the plan. If there’s something specific you want to criticize then that would be an interesting discussion, but simply claiming high speed rail is a bad idea because reasons is just noise.
This post doesn’t have that detail. I’m only critiquing the project based on the information at hand which you provided. If there is noise, it is because the resolution of the plan as detailed is allow you are going to only get noise as part of the discussion. I don’t know if the planning has been gotten to my discussion points yet.
You had also said several times asking if I thought the African economists did their jobs competently. It sounds like an appeal to authority to not talk about what is known. I’m looking at this project as being planned by experts and I haven’t said anything to suggest otherwise. However, people can still critique experts.