Recognise traffic jam for the silent killer it is

According to your recent article, Uganda loses about Shs500m in traffic jam daily. 
Although we should indeed be concerned about such a huge daily financial loss, money is not the only thing we are losing as a nation due to traffic jams.

Every day, many school-going children whose parents must travel to or through Kampala City are robbed of hours of sleep because they must leave home at the same time as their parents (who drop them at school) for whom the earlier they leave home the better their chances of beating the city jam. This way of life denies

children ample sleep which is critical for brain development and overall health.

As children are losing sleep time, the adults are losing free time. Adults who have to travel to and from the city everyday seldom have free time because most of what would have been free time is spent as travel time. As a result, relationships in marriages, families and communities are greatly strained with the job often wrongly branded the thief of free time.

For those with private cars, the lack of free time is probably why many are always trying to do so much on their way home—catching up on a lot of the non-job related business on their phones while also driving—a recipe for road accidents.
The lack of free time also means that workers are not getting the rest their bodies need to be able to recuperate for continued optimal performance.

People also inhale toxic fumes from surrounding vehicles in the jam.

In comparison, when one considers everything we are losing as a country to traffic jams, the Shs500 million should be the least of our concern. 

Traffic jam cannot kill an economy but the risks it poses to human life and its development are life threatening.

According to the article, a number of solutions to the traffic jam pandemic in Kampala City are currently being considered. However, all the proposed solutions appear focused on only enabling the faster movement of cars. Such solutions are not apt because (1) the number of cars is only going to continue increasing and (2) the proposed solutions require massive financial investment (which the government is most likely to borrow).

The long-term and sustainable solution to Kampala traffic jams is to find ways of enabling a significant portion of those who commute to the city for work carry out their work effectively without coming to the city because cars are found where people are.

Why should an employee who manages the social media channels for an organisation have to travel every day to the city when his work is online? 

Why should staff whose work takes place on a computer have to travel to the city to meet their computer? Surely, moving computers/workstations closer to the people should be much cheaper.
It is in the best interest of all employers to find ways of having their staff carry out their work without having to make non-value-adding trips to the city. 

If employees cannot work effectively from home, employers should hire workspaces for their staff outside of the city. The goal is to have employees delivering on their responsibilities, not them travelling.

Employers must wake up and recognise traffic jam for the silent workforce killer it is. And I believe it is the private sector to lead the way in solving the traffic jam pandemic in Kampala City because central government appears hell-bent on concentrating all its workforce within Kampala City.

Reagan Turakira,  Kampala