Kenya Railways Introduces Express Service for Nairobi Commuters

PresientUhuru Kenyatta at the Nairobi Central Railway Station on November 10, 2020.
Former President Uhuru Kenyatta at the Nairobi Central Railway Station on November 10, 2020.
PSCU

Kenya Railways has introduced a new schedule that includes an express train service for Nairobi commuters. This comes after the arrival of six more Diesel Multiple Units (DMUs) from Spain earlier in May 2021.

The express service will serve the Embakasi and the Nairobi Central Business District (CBD) route and will be operational, three times during the day - early morning, mid-morning, and in the evening hours.

As per the schedule released by Kenya Railways on Thursday, May 27, the Diesel Multiple Units (DMUs) in the morning hours will not stop at any of the usual Makadara, Donholm, Pipeline stations along the route while the evening one will only stop for a maximum of two minutes at each station.

The earliest DMU train will depart Nairobi Central station at 5:45 a.m. with an expected arrival time at the Embakasi Village of 6:29 a.m.

The Nairobi-Embakasi route schedule
The Nairobi-Embakasi route schedule released on May 27, 2021.
Kenya Railways

The midmorning express train is scheduled to leave the main station at 11:00 a.m to arrive at the Embakasi Village station at 11:28 a.m.

As for the evening, the train will depart the CBD at 8:00 p.m. with an arrival time of 8:34 p.m.

At the same time, the frequency of the train services has been increased to accommodate more commuters at different times of the day. 

With the new schedule, there will be four morning trains between 6:20 a.m. and 10:15 a.m from Embakasi to the Nairobi CBD.

Syokimau to Nairobi route will now have hourly trains departing at 6:20 a.m, 7:15 a.m., 8:40 a.m and 10:40 a.m for the Central station in the morning hours.

KR chairman Omudho Awitta had earlier stated that the corporation would increase the number of services upon receiving the second batch of trains.

"The batch of six DMU’s has arrived in the country from Spain. We will now have trains running every hour across the Nairobi metropolitan area," Awitta disclosed.

With more trains, routes, and frequencies, the transport agency plans to increase its capacity from the current 13,000 to 132,000 passengers a day by 2022.

A train in the revamped Nairobi Commuter Rail system
A train in the revamped Nairobi Commuter Rail system
Twitter
Kenya Railways