How can High Standard Education System Affect Our Transportation Sector?
Photo by Paul IJsendoorn from Pexels
You may ask, what does the transportation system has to do with the education system? Is it not for someone to buy a vehicle, register it in the commercial registration numbers, perhaps paint on the state’s public transport colors, register with National Union of Road Transport Workers (NURTW), get fixed into a plying route, get a bus conductor, and then—boom— the hustle continues.
Another one of commercial transport vehicle has just been added to the transportation sector, and the hustle continues.
If only that the problems of the transportation system in our country are solved by the scenario described above, then the transportation sector will have no problem at all. People who have little or no idea of other transportation modes, as practiced in the developed countries, would see our transportation sector as normal, and with no need for improvement.
But those that have traveled to advanced countries, or those like me, who do not have an international passport, but have indulged their minds in the ‘window of the world’, and have seen the world through the lens of words and illustrations can testify that Nigeria’s means of commuting is terrible. Perhaps the country with the worst means of transportation in the world.
Fela’s words, ‘suffering and smiling’ which he sang in one of his songs, has become a horrible reality when it comes to the transportation system in Nigeria. The metropolitans are the worst hit by the poor functioning of the transportation sector.
There you find old model rickety buses overloaded with commuters as if they are sub-human species; drivers who would have washed their mouths with early morning liquor; no glasses on the busses’ windows; no good seats, smoke in the vehicles, preachers or market sellers adding to the chaos; scarred face conductors shinning their smoked teeth, and if care is not taking pickpocket passengers might steal your items.
Bad road network, less availability of other means of transporting, long queue, exorbitant fare charges, traffic jam, rushing and dragging to enter a bus, painful standing especially on long rides, poorly trained drivers, multiple monetary dues to touts, are among the challenges facing the transport sector.
Can Nigeria’s transportation sector be revamped? The advanced countries are progressing their transportation sector that a distance equivalent to Lagos to Kano can be covered using a high-speed train in an hour and a half. Practically, the same time it takes people to get from Lagos Mainland to Victoria Island in a traffic-jammed day.
Japan is leading with the worlds fastest train; Dubai is experimenting with futuristic transport mode—Hoopla— China is diversifying its modes of going to places that it has the world's longest on the water bridge.
Moving from one European nation to the other using high-speed train is just a matter of hours. Germany is having over four times of road networks as South Africa, Africa’s most road-networked nation. Bridges in U.S. number close to 100,000, its sub-terrestrial rail system is the highest in the world.
A number of European countries are experimenting and implementing less fossil fuel vehicles with special roads being constructed for rechargeable cars. Singapore would cut the numbers of its fossil fuel vehicles by half before 2050.
We in Nigeria are yet to have even good, safety, and well-maintained city busses. Nothing like trams, streetcars, sound street busses, bicycle paths or bicycle renting system, monorail system, high standard rail system with ultramodern coaches.
We do not have well-structured transportation arrangement that goods would be moved using haulage vehicles different from the busses carrying humans. As most buses used in carrying humans here in Nigeria were once used to haul goods and animals in other countries where they were shipped from, for example, Volks Wagen LT busses.
The buses carrying humans here do not have proper safety provisions, no well-cushioned seats, no seat-belts. Well, that is the luxury of individuals who own their own cars —but, what stops similar condition being put in place on all vehicles commuting humans?
Must our transportation activities be tedious? Commercial transportation drivers and their conductors look tout-like —they hustle from dawn to dusk, day in day out, month to month, year to year, yet have little or nothing to account for their toil.
The transportation industry is a strong income generating sector that generates enormous wealth to those that apply high intelligence through quality education standard to the sector. Even some governors in Nigeria have to take cognizant of the enormous potential for income which transportation industry can offer.
Though they just saw the tip-of-the-iceberg opportunities, and they are already dreaming of monopolizing the sector. Nigerians must be soundly educated to be able to see better and more benefiting ways things can be done. China’s bicycle riding means of transportation is now a multi-million dollar business enterprise that offers bicycles for rent to commuters who would ride the bicycles to their destination, and drop it off to the company’s post closest to them. However getting a bike to rent is usually through a phone app.
Individuals in the U.S. have revolutionized the taxi system with the introduction of technology-driven cabs such as Uber, Taxify, and Lyft. These are billion-dollar corporations, and they are now experimenting with driverless taxi systems. There’s no way advanced technology could have affected the transportation system so deeply without the advancement of the education system.
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