The Zomba Road

The road between Blantyre and Zomba was the first tarmac road in Malawi, joining the colonial capital of Zomba with the commercial center of the land. Both cities have grown since independence came to Malawi in 1964 but the road has remained the original narrow, snaking two lane tarmac, now with crumbling edges and filled potholes. That is until June of this year. That is when road reconstruction began. This is something that has been talked about for over 10 year, so to see it actually happening is an encouragement on one level and a challenge on another.

The encouragement is that it will make a great difference in travel time and travel safety once it is completed. It is an indication of developmental progress being made in the country as such infrastructures are keys to progress, to growth. This is great hope for the future. The challenge is living through the construction. Preparations for this have been in the works for well over a year, as land was bought up alongside the existing road, and trees back from the roadway were bought and cut down to make way for the expansion of the road and for “diversions,” Malawi’s alternative to detours. A diversion is a temporary dirt roadway parallel to the road being constructed. In June the diversions were started and subsequently the actual road construction was begun at the locations where the diversions were build. The project is moving forward with gusto. Almost 40 kilometers of the 70 kilometer road has diversions, and construction, at various levels, is underway.



Minibus zooming along the diversion.

Last week, I had to make a trip to Zomba. I was warned that the diversions would be rough on my small car, so a friend offered to drive her 4 wheel truck, since we also had items to transport. I was grateful for the higher and smoother ride – not that it was all that smooth, given the makeshift nature of the road. The idea is that the diversion is only temporary. It is just cleared dirt, roughly provided to make vehicle passage possible around the work. The diversions are dusty at the moment. Once the rains come, they will be muddy and rutted. But they serve their purpose. Speed limits of 40 kilometers per hour are posted, which slow travel considerable. In places that is not even a safe speed, but the minibuses don’t take that into consideration. They still feel they need to make time to make money, so they only go as slowly as the traffic in front of them, and pass as soon as they can, raising a screen of dust. This gives graphic meaning to the phrase, “Eat my dust.” The old trip of an hour took us an hour and 50 minutes.. This will increase as the work areas expand over the next 2 years of the projected time of construction. We arrived dust covered – passengers and vehicle. Since this is the primary access to Zomba from Blantyre, I’m sure I will be adjusting to the dust and the roughness. As I contemplated this on the long trip back, I realized it could be worse. I could be sitting still in traffic on the Parkway East in Pittsburgh, trying to negotiate the construction of the Squirrel Hill Tunnels, taking an hour to go 5 miles. At least traffic is moving on the Zomba road – dusty but moving.