Lagos State government receives applause for supporting quality projects
THE Ambode government should be applauded for not only working assiduously to see Lagos evolving as a mega city but must be highly commended for its readiness to collaborate and unflinchingly support any group, organization, or institution that is ready to share its dream and aspiration to see the entire State emerging as number one in Nigeria in terms of excellence.
This was highly demonstrated in the recently concluded projects by the Deeperlife Bible Church aimed at not only making accessibility to its headquarters very convenient but also to ensure that the people living in the locality are not subjected to any state of discomfort by the large number of worshippers that would soon be trooping to the edifice.
These facts were buttressed, first, by the Project Architect, Kayode Dada who masterminded the turning around of the old axis of Gbagada and gave the environment a new phase. Secondly, the Premises Manager, Ifeanyi Emmanuel Okoye, saddled with the responsibility of monitoring the progress of the work to ensure that the building of the edifice is finally brought to conclusion according to plan, also commented on government agencies unalloyed support during construction.
“The Church embarked on this huge investment to ensure that there is sanity around this area with a view to doing away with what people in this area used to know Deeperlife for in those days with a lot of traffic.
“Such would not happen again and the community here is now comfortable.
“However, we need to extend our gratitude to the Lagos State government in getting the work done.
“Our gratitude goes to the Ministry of transportation, the ministry of physical planning, ministry of environment and works and infrastructures. They all assisted in putting things together.
“As a matter of fact, the Ministry of Works and Infrastructures staff did supervision with us right from the piling stage to the building of the car park.
“The stage monitoring of quality of work by Lagos State government is indeed appreciated” he said.
Dada also commended Lagos State Traffic Management Authority (LASTMA) officials. “When the bridge was to be constructed, there was a kind of awareness and sensitization organized by the agency together with the Church to re-direct the traffic while the construction was going on.
“Up till now, they are still monitoring the traffic” he added.
Dada explaining the reason behind construction of the bridge disclosed that it was put up to allow worshippers pass under the bridge and also for the use of the community, adding that the innovation would completely minimize both human and vehicular traffic in the area.
“We have noticed that pedestrian traffic is more dangerous and as we are expecting a lot of worshippers, we felt it would be the best to take them out of the road.
Dada also threw light into the commissioning of the car park which he described as multi-leveled, with four floors.
He explained that the first three levels were designed to accommodate 555 cars while the fourth floor has been dedicated to buses, revealing that the Church has procured 50 buses with the intention of getting more. “We do not want any traffic and pains as a result of lots of vehicles coming to Gbagada as we want convenience for everyone.
“We are accommodating 76 buses in the park allocated for buses. As I said, we are getting more buses and the whole idea is to reduce the number of cars being brought to Church by these category of worshippers” he said. Dada highlighted the fact behind the commissioned traffic light which he said was aimed at controlling, moderating and directing traffic.
“We want organized system. There is heavy traffic around the world. It all depends on how they are controlled.
“As a matter of fact, we have in New York, three times numbers of vehicles that we have in Lagos and yet they are organized.
“This is what we are replicating here to effectively control the traffic” he said.
Commenting on the uncommon architecture of both bridge and car park, Dada attributed the inspiration to God, supporting his attribution to the fact that anyone familiar with the area would not have taught that the kind of evolving architectural work now in place could ever come up.
“I do not think that there is any type of this park anywhere in Nigeria. The design is a concept that came out of the terrain here.
“We could not go too high, otherwise we would completely raise the elevation of the Church. It was better to go down and still have four levels.
“The bow-like shape of the land gave room to what we have today.
“There is no any other one like this unless this would be copied” he said.