A post from https://x.com/JK_Kazoora/status/2024078137445826892/mediaViewer?currentTweet=2024078137445826892¤tTweetUser=JK_Kazoora reignited a familiar frustration many of us share about the experience of living in Kampala.

It is easy—almost convenient—to blame Kampala’s congestion on the usual suspects: the poor state of our road network, archaic and fragmented public transport, increasing vehicle ownership, rapid population growth. All of these contribute significantly to the daily ordeal that commuting within Kampala has become, but there is a deeper, more structural issue that we consistently overlook - We are building before we are planning!

Our government appears to be paying considerable attention to organized urban development. Policies are drafted, laws are passed, new agencies, town and municipal councils are formed. Yet implementation remains slow and weak at best, short-sighted and ineffective at worst.

Recent attempts to “tighten control” over built development often seem less about restoring order and more about creating administrative bottlenecks—rather than delivering coherent urban form.

In 2011, when Kampala Capital City Authority (KCCA) replaced the former Kampala City Council, many professionals in the built environment saw a rare opportunity to transform Uganda’s capital. An entire ministry was created for Kampala, signalling a national recognition of the importance of well-planned urban centres.

Yet an important question remains: Why has the quality of life in the city not improved significantly—or in some respects, even deteriorated?

At the time, it was evident that significant urban expansion was imminent. According to the World Bank, Uganda has been doubling its urban population approximately every decade. The growth was visible, and the pressure was predictable.

A meaningful portion of resources could have been directed toward comprehensive planning of the greater metropolitan ring—Wakiso, Buloba, Kira, Kasangati, Matugga, Mukono—before sprawl overtook these areas.

Instead, investment focused heavily within the core, while the expanding rim received limited structural guidance.

Today, several trillion shillings later: Congestion in Kampala persists—if not worsens; the surrounding municipalities are urbanising rapidly, often without coherent spatial frameworks; the urban sprawl that could have been guided now exerts pressure back onto the core

A critical question arises: What mechanisms are there to ensure that private land subdivision aligns with approved local structure plans, if any? The results are predictable: Fragmented road networks; Dead-end access roads; No reserved corridors for future infrastructure; inadequate provision of open spaces and community amenities; and commercial strips mushrooming along every newly paved road. Once established, these patterns are costly—sometimes impossible—to correct.

Town and municipal authorities need to take control of the direction of development within their jurisdictions. They should establish fully functional planning departments—not planners by title alone—that continuously prepare detailed plans for new growth areas before development begins and ensure strict adherence to those plans.

This would enable properly structured satellite towns that are attractive places to locate offices and businesses, with schools and services close to where people live—ultimately reducing the commuter volumes that overwhelm our roads daily

Better infrastructure alone cannot cure poor urban form. Kampala’s solutions to congestion lie in how its suburbs are treated. We cannot asphalt our way out of disorder. We cannot widen roads indefinitely. We cannot regulate chaos after it has matured.

Congestion is not merely a transport problem—it is a spatial planning failure. When people live far from their workplaces, they commute. When schools are distant from homes, parents drive. When satellite towns function primarily as dormitories rather than economic nodes, traffic will concentrate in one direction every morning and evening. This is geometry, not politics.

What Kampala needs is not simply better roads—it requires metropolitan-scale spatial planning: Pre-development structure planning for all growth areas; Enforced subdivision guidelines aligned to approved local plans; Metropolitan coordination across Kampala, Entebbe, Wakiso and Mukono; Intentional development of economic nodes outside the CBD; and establishing professionalized planning departments with technical competence. If expansion is not deliberately structured, it will structure itself—inefficiently.

Kampala’s congestion is not inevitable. It is, in many ways, the outcome of incremental and reactive growth. The question is not whether we can afford to plan properly. The question is whether we can afford not to.

As practitioners in the built environment, we believe that thoughtful planning is not optional—it is the foundation of sustainable national development.