Abstract

Intensive urbanization began in Nigeria after national independence on October 01, 1960. Before independence, the ratio of urban/rural residents was slightly below 30 percent; today it is above 50 percent. Provincial towns have grown into cities; and the population of Lagos has grown from less than 1 million people (before independence) to about 15 million people today. This intensive urbanization began in Nigeria in the era (the second half of the 20th century) in which the automobile was considered to be the most suitable means of transportation worldwide; and many Nigerian cities are totally auto-dependent. Total urban transportation itself is a very vast subject. It has, thus, become prudent to narrow the discussion in this paper to three aspects of urban transportation (that are lacking in the Nigerian cities of today): pedestrianism, cycling and light-rail tram. The need to design urban motorways that make specific and ample provisions for pedestrianism and cycling has been discussed. It has been shown that light-rail trams are again being promoted as one of the most reliable and cost-effective means of mass-transit in the world, since the last two decades of the 20th century. There is, thus, the need to consciously make provisions in the designs of today’s urban motorways for light-rail tramways that will certainly become very essential in the Nigerian cities of the future. In doing this, there is the need to forestall the possibilities of such provisions being eroded, in the course of time, by reason of intense urbanization pressures.