Mozambique: Maputo council trying to encourage people to use bicycles in city

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Mozambique: Maputo council trying to encourage people to use bicycles in city

8:43 CAT | 31 Jul 2023

Photo: Alex Muianga/Facebook

The Maputo city council on Monday suggested the use of bicycles as an alternative means of transport in the Mozambican capital, at a time when the Maputo metropolitan area is home to 70% of the country’s car fleet.

“The use of bicycles is a safe alternative for the future. If we continue to think that the car is the practical way of getting around, I think we will not be building a sustainable society”, said Alexandre Muianga, councillor for transport and mobility in the Maputo City Council.

The official was speaking in Maputo during the launch of the “Maputo Bike Riding” initiative, an event to promote alternative means of urban mobility, in which at least 200 people are expected to participate.

According to the transport councillor, there is a certain tendency to use bicycles as a means of travel in Maputo by “students, workers and various other people” and the intention of the municipality is to “continue to raise awareness in the community” about opting for this means of transportation. .

“We call ton the community to start finding alternative forms [of transport]”, said Alexandre Muianga, mentioning that conditions will be created for greater road safety.

The “Maputo Pedalando” initiative, to take place on the 19th of August, will travel through several avenues in the capital, arriving at Praça da Independência.

Participants in the race will travel around 65 kilometres, with prizes awarded to the top three.

The Maputo metropolitan area, with around three million inhabitants, covers the district of Marracuene and the municipalities of Maputo, Matola and Boane, concentrating “more than 70% of the car fleet of the whole country”, according to data provided by the Mozambican Minister of Transport.

This morning, the Ministry of Labour cancelled an extraordinary meeting of the advisory council that had been convened to discuss the proposal to stagger service hours to minimize the congestion that has been registered in the Greater Maputo region.

The transport sector in Mozambique is one of the most deficient in terms of public services in the country, mainly road transport, where the crisis of means triggered the use of open-top vehicles, jokingly known as “my loves”, given the physical proximity with which passengers travel in the goods cargo box and the need to sometimes hug each other so as not to fall on the road.

The situation tends to get worse due to the escalation in fuel prices, with constant stoppages of passenger transport in several Mozambican cities, in protest at the lack of an increase in travel tariffs, which are regulated.

Source: Lusa