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December 2015
News
T
he Transport for Cape Town
(TCT) Congestion Summit
hosted by City of Cape Town
Executive Mayor, Patricia de Lille
revealed that in 2013, the TomTom
global traffic index rated Cape Town
as the 55
th
most congested city in
global rankings.
The survey also revealed that mo-
torists are spending an extra 71% of
their time in traffic.
De Lille said: “We are also the fast-
est growing city in the country, with a
growth rate of 30% according to the
2011 Census. Congestion comes at a
great cost, with time and money be-
ing lost, but also in terms of pollution
and its long-term effect on our living
environment.”
The City’s Mayoral Committee
Member: Transport for Cape Town,
Brett Herron and delegates from Na-
tional andWestern Cape government
will also have towork together to find
economically sustainable long-term
solutions to ensure that we meet
the travel demands of a population
which is predicted to increase to
R750 million for road infrastructure
The City of Cape Town has proposed R750 million for
road infrastructure to alleviate traffic congestion.
approximately 5,6 million by 2032.
Transport for Cape Town’s latest
statistics confirm that the morning
peak-hour period on the city’s major
arteries has already increased from
7am to 9am to the current 6am to
10am within two years. More resi-
dents are leaving their homes at 5am
in themorning to avoid traffic conges-
tion on their way to work.
The Kuils River area around
Bottelary, Amandel and Saxdown
Roads; Kommetjie aroundOu Kaapse
Weg and Kommetjie Road; and the
Blaauwberg area around Plattekloof,
Blaauwberg and Sandown Roads
are among some of the first pressure
points to be addressed.
Further pressure points that the
Congestion Programme will be cov-
ering include congestion along the
M3, M5, N1 and N2 freeways, the V&A
Waterfront and foreshore. De Lille
proposes that the R750 million is
spent in accordance with a Conges-
tion Management Programme and
approved by Council by the end of the
year. This will prioritise congestion
points across the city andaddress this
in terms of infrastructure, operations
and behavioural change.
TCT is currently responsible for the
planning and implementation of the
MyCiTi bus rapid transit mode within
the public transport network. In real-
ity, MyCiTi footprint is still relatively
small and carries a small percentage
of the city’s daily commuters. On the
other hand, the Golden Arrow Bus
Service (GABS) is providing a sched-
uled bus service to hundreds of thou-
sands of daily commuters and does
so under amonth-to-month contract
with the Western Cape Government.
“TCT should be the contracting
authority for GABS, since this will give
us the opportunity and the responsi-
bility to integrate and align GABS and
MyCiTi services with each other and
ultimately with Metrorail.”
The City submitted an application
to the National Government for the
assignment of the contracting au-
thority function, which relates to this
scheduled bus services contract in
October 2012, and for the municipal
regulatory authority function in May
2013. Unfortunately the city is still
waiting for the Minister of Transport
to respond.
With the integration of the My-
CiTi, GABS and Metrorail services,
commuters will start to experience
flexibility with the roll-out of the
myconnect ticketing system across
the board. A trip will become one
journey, with one fare regardless of
transfers across the different modes
or services.
■
Patricia de Lille