Design that Matters Field Journal

On the Road in West Africa

Taking to the paved roads between cities, the few private cars you'll see are carrying either big-business types, government muckety-mucks or foreign NGO personnel. The average person--that is, the minority group who actually leaves the village--travels around by the various forms of public transportation.

These include, in descending order of ticket cost: the bus (like our beloved Somatra line), the gbaka or sotrama (a 22-person minivan with either vinyl seats or after-market wooden benches)

the bashé (a Peugeot minitruck with a partially-covered back and wooden or metal benches),

the sept-place (a Peugeot station wagon fitted with extra seats in the trunk, that carries between seven and ten),

the taxi-brousse (a Peugeot sedan that seats five and up), the zemidjan (a motorcycle or moped taxi that carries as many as three passengers)

and various forms of wagons and carts (horse, donkey, and oxcarts are all common means of transportation between market towns in rural Mali).

Posted by Timothy Prestero at August 4, 2003 01:46 PM