Dis GAI sef!

Traffic

By Ibrahim Ganiyu

Its been two hours now since their bus left the terminal at ojota. The nearly endless rows of midlane gardens were beautiful and made one feel at peace, but after two hours in a commercial transport, the flowers begin to lose their attraction.

The trip from ojota to CMS shouldnt take more than 15 minutes on a regualr day but today is obviously not a regular day.

There's a long stretch of traffic ahead of and behind their bus as far as the eye can see. everybody in the bus is obviously not comfortable even with the environmental control (EC) units in the bus functioning at their poor best. The bus itself is okay. well, okay for the average commbus operating the yellowblack service on Eko roadways. You could feel the absorbosprings through the leather seat. okay, the synthetic leather. Give and take a few cuts and patches here and there, the seats were relatively clean. Long lines of finger smear of oil - possibly from a  kid who ate superpuffs on the bus' last trip - stained the back of the seat in front of the young guy in a green with gold embriodery Bamubamu top over dark green jeans. His hair in the afroruffs favoured by most fans of the top Nigerian artisite D'Nice. He was lost in his thoughts.

The bus had just snailed past the busstop at NewOnipan when the argument started.

"Driver, this holdup is too much, lets take the Sabo/Alogomeji route o" Someone yelled from the back of the 16 seater commbus.

"Why? that's a long journey now. The Original OjuelegbaSL road is okay. at least the traffic is moving" someone else in the front seat countered.

"you call this one moving?" chimed in yet another.

"Yes, he can just go across the Maglev tracks and enter thruough the SL Mushin intersect"

"why not just go through Yaba?" One man from the second to the last seats said.

"No o!!!!!" chorused everybody in the bus except the youngman

Everybody knows by now not to go through the Yaba axis, the 6th mainland express is being built and will run through the Oyingbo maglev terminal. The Eko Traffic Corps have been diverting all traffic through the Yaba-SL linkway since construction started three weeks ago.

The young man in green and gold chipped in.

"We cant go through Sabo/Alagomeji. its blocked" he sounded final.

"Thats not possible, the road is a 6 lane way with overhead 4 lane maglevs with accessways to Makoko linking the old 3rd mainland bridge." a man in corporate clothes spoke from the seat behind him.

"Yes, thats true. Driver, lets take Sabo o!" The woman beside him said. Judging by the number of hand bangles and gold rings she had on, she most probably sold clothes at the shopping arcade near broad street.

"I am telling you the road is blocked" The young man repeated.

"How do you know?" said the old man sitting to his right. The old man looked at him in a look that seemed set to challenge whatever knowledge the young could claim to have.

"My airbus flight from Ikorodu to Ojota 4 hours ago was diverted over the Ogudu ways and I could see the Sabo ways and the old bridge...its was bumper to bumper." explained the youngman.

The other passengers seem to pause a little as they mentally sought ways to discredit this information. someone found one way.

"But thats four hours ago now! it could have eased keh!?" said the corporate guy.

"okay, okay,...Driver?" The young man wasnt going to let these people set him on a wrong path.

"Yes? "

The driver had not entered into the conversation all this while and when he answered the young man's call now, one could hear an undertone of electronic speech in his voice. As he turned to look back, a thick scar across his throat shows that he had once survived a murder -  a regular occurrence at commbus garages these days - and the cybernetic speech assist implanted in his voicebox is proof of it. A small device over his right ear leans to the possibilities of other enhancements,...or repairs.

"Shey your holoscreen dey work?" The young man asked

"make i check. I never try am since one of those garage boys try to steal the array. make i on am abi? "

"Yes, abeg"

A small speck of purple light flickered brightly and after several flicks - and two punches to the terminal box from the driver- the screen stabilised. A bright 3 by 2 feet display floated in the space dividing the driver's side from the passengers. every body in the bus stopped in shock.

"So, you get holoscreen wey dey work and you no put any film or music on since?"

"What is wrong with you Drivers sef? Dont you understand the importance of service?" It was the corporate guy again.

The driver reached towards his right ear and flicked something, it was his Audiplex earing aid. Its obviously off now because he just smiled as the passengers shouted at him.

"Oloshi, you have turned off your hearing abi? The clothes woman was shouting now. "May you be deaf like that o! No amount of cybernetics will heal that foolishness in your empty brain! Its not your fault, its my son that took the Geecar out. if not, what am i doing in a rickety commbus?"

"I am sure the idiot doesn't even have flight permit" she continued to no one in particular.

"that is assuming the vehicle has flight capacity sef!" said the old man.

"abi o!"

"I think it does but the real question is does he even have flying licence?" said the corporate guy.

"Oh-hoo!" exclaimed the woman.

"see there, the thing is expired!" said the man sitting in the chairs immediately behind the driver pointing at the Universal Transpermit Indicator on the bus' dashboard near the Steering arc. The Driver has a flight licence that had expired 6 months earlier and the reminder flashed a constant red on the dashboard. If he attempted to get into the skylanes he will be demobilsed and arrested withing 10 seconds. The Rapid Response Unit of the ETC lives up to its name.

The young man brought out his Gaison Omniphone as the passengers resumed the route argument even though the bus had not moved an inch since they passed the NewOnipan busstop.

He flicked open the browser and typed in the Eko Traffic Monitor website address. As soon as the page opened seconds later, he touched and dragged the page fron the the Omniphone's 5 inch touchsense display and flicked his fingers at the bus' holoscreen.

The passengers stopped for a second as a sharp live feed video appeared on the holoscreen. The young man was right after all.

The screen was a splitview of two videos showing the same place. One video feed was showing the Sabo/Alagomeji broadways from the Unilag Junction end and the other showed it from the LAWROCK Research Building at Alagomeji in a panoramic view that also shows the start of the Makoko linkway.

The two videos said the same thing: logjam.

The 6 and overhead 4 lane ways were just an endless stretch of cars, Neolues (it seemed the spirit of the Molue will always haunt Lagos though they were still banned from certain parts of the metropolis), commbuses and cargotrucks. Even the BTRX lane was packed. The Maglev trains were not moving either and for a service promoted as being traffic-free, this was a big shock.

On the bottom left side of the screen it read: CAM20677, Sabo/Alagomeji ETMS VIDLIVE TIME: 13:45 GMT

The passengers stared for a few seconds even as the image remained still. If the side clock on the screen hadn't moved one would have thought the image was a photograph. An ETC officer's aerial bike floated by on the screen to further ground the truth.

"Oh God!whats is this now?!"

"Is there no other..."

Before the old man could finish the question, the youngman flicked another image to the holoscreen creating a new window which now displayed the Yaba roadways and confirmed what they had all feared,...they had to wait it out.

The young man reflected, he always had misgivings about going to the Island, especially since the completion of the second Atlantic City by the administration of  governor Babatunde Ahmed Jakande III. Its always bottle-necked for apparently no reason and sometimes it appeared the roads themselves just create the traffic to enjoy the company of road users for a while because most traffic within the island is by airbus these days. He wondered also if the traffic was not engineered artificially to favour some companies and their products. The enduring Gala sausage roll and Superyogo for instance, and considering the high taxes these companies are paying the state, it was not a hard conclusion to jump to. He thought of this as a familiar sound interrupted everyone from the right side of the commbus

"Gala yes! buy your yoghourt here! Chocolate yoghourt here!"

The electronic voice of the Automated Robostreethawker distracted everyone from the despair of another possible 2 hours on this road. Through its domed glass top sectioned into its antigrav floating body one could see the hot Gala rolls in their newly re-branded red, white and black thermowraps (one wonders what they had rebranded though) and in the second compartment lay enticingly cold frozen packs of the State's most loved dairy product, Superyogo. No changes here, "super" as its called by everybody is still wrapped in its classic white and green nylophane.

They were going to be here for a while and they all knew this. Hands flashed through the now opened side windows, flashed ATMX kobocards through the robostreethawker's  payslots and steaming hot Gala rolled out with equally steaming cold Superyogo on the side.

The young man considered his options, one way or another he was going to get to the office just a few minutes before closing time, he might as well relax.

He reached into his pocket for his kobocard.