Our team is set to begin a critical mission aimed at enhancing road safety in Burundi. The project, funded by a $120 million grant from the World Bank, is part of the broader Transport Resilience Project (PRT). Our specific role involves a road safety audit and an iRAP assessment.
The project will focus on the detailed design of two major sections:
- The 25 km stretch of the RN 3 national road between Bujumbura and Gitaza.
- The 4.2 km section covering the Mwambutsa and Ndadaye boulevards in Bujumbura.
Our work will be carried out in multiple phases to ensure a comprehensive approach. We will begin by conducting a road safety audit and iRAP evaluation of the detailed design plans for these roads. This includes using the iRAP Star Rating for Design (SR4D) tool to identify potential hazards and recommend improvements to make the roads safer for all users, especially vulnerable ones like pedestrians and cyclists.
A significant part of our mission is to assess road safety at schools along the project roads using the iRAP Star Rating for Schools (SR4S) tool. The goal is to recommend measures to achieve a rating of at least three stars or higher for these school zones.
Additionally, our team will collect five years of historical data on crashes, deaths, and injuries from police and hospital records to better understand the current safety landscape. The project is expected to be completed in approximately four months, with the mission scheduled to begin in September 2025.
This project directly supports the broader objective of providing safe, efficient, and climate-resilient road connectivity along a key corridor linking Burundi to Tanzania. By improving the design of these roads, we aim to contribute to a significant reduction in fatal crashes, with a target of decreasing them from 50 to 15 per year on the RN-3 section.
