The railway system consists of several major sections: ; Mombasa–Nairobi Section This section, measuring, is known as the Mombasa–Nairobi Standard Gauge Railway, and connects the port city of Mombasa and Nairobi, the capital and largest city of Kenya. Passenger rail services between Mombasa and Nairobi started on 1 June 2017, and freight rail services on 1 January 2018. It was built between October 2016 and January 2018, by China Road and Bridge Corporation, at a cost of US$3.6 billion, 90 percent of which was borrowed from the Exim Bank of China, with the Kenyan government providing the remaining 10 percent. ; Nairobi–Naivasha Section This section was also contracted to the company that constructed the Mombasa–Nairobi Section. The line stretches from Nairobi to Naivasha, a distance of about, at cost of KSh150 billion, borrowed from the China Export-Import Bank. Construction began in 2018 and is expected to conclude in December 2019. International freight for neighbouring countries interchanges at the Naivasha Inland Container Depot. ; Naivasha–Kisumu Section This section, measuring, stretching from Naivasha to Kisumu, on the eastern shores of Lake Victoria, is contracted to China Communications Construction Company, at a budgeted cost of KSh380 billion, borrowed from China Exim Bank. Loan papers between Kenya and China were scheduled for signatures in September 2018, but were deferred until a commercial viability study is conducted on the entire Mombasa–Kisumu railway. ; Kisumu–Malaba Section This section, measuring approximately, takes the SGR line to the town of Malaba, at the international border with Uganda. CCCC, is the contractor for this section as well. The contract price for this section is about US$1.69 billion. The price for the Naivasha–Kisumu–Malaba section is US$5.49 billion and includes the laying of railway tracks in both sections, dredging and expansion of the port of Kisumu, and the expansion and modernization of the inland container depot at Embakasi, in Nairobi. ; Lamu–Lokichar-Nakodok Section This railway line, totaling, is a component of the Lamu Port and Lamu-Southern Sudan-Ethiopia Transport Corridor development project. Under the LAPSSET plan, this line would be extended to Juba in South Sudan. ; Nairobi–Moyale Section This section also falls under the LAPSSET program. It extends from Nairobi to Moyale, at the international border with Kenya's northern neighbor. It is planned to be extended to Addis Ababa, the capital city of Ethiopia. ; Naivasha–Lokichar Section This proposed railway link, measuring an estimated, would link the two main standard gauge railway systems in Kenya; the Mombasa–Malaba SGR System and the Lamu–Nakodok SGR System.
Overview
This 1435 mm railway line is intended to ease the transfer of goods and passengers between the port of Mombasa and the cities of Nairobi and Kisumu, in Kenya, Kampala in Uganda, Kigali in Rwanda and subsequently to Bujumbura in Burundi, Juba in South Sudan and to Goma and Bunia in the Democratic Republic of the Congo. In March 2019, during a state visit to Kenya, President Yoweri Museveni of Uganda and his host, President Uhuru Kenyatta of Kenya, jointly, publicly committed to extend the Standard Gauge Railway to Kampala via Malaba.
Standards
The lines are being build according to Chinese standards.
The project alongside many other in Africa under the Belt and Road Initiative have been criticized as an effort by the government of China to debt-trap various nations.
