Colonel Sir John Wallace Pringle, CB, FRGS (23 May 1863 – 16 July 1938) was a British engineer who was Chief Inspecting Officer of the Railways Inspectorate of the Ministry of Transport from 1916 to 1929.
The survey's findings confirmed that the caravan route to the Great Rift Valley was the best path for the line, followed by the easiest gradient to be found over the Mau Escarpment and down to Lake Victoria.
They suggested that Kikuyuland would be a suitable place for whites to live, and their civilizing effect would drive out slavery, but the railway was needed to give access to the new colony.
[6] Pringle had reached the rank of Major in 1900 when he was appointed an inspecting officer in the Board of Trade.
At the start of World War I in 1914, he was appointed a deputy director of railway transport with the temporary rank of Colonel.