Skip to main content

South Africa to upgrade public transport

Speaking at the launch of South Africa’s 2013 Transport Month, Transport Minister Dipuo Peters pledged to spend more than US$500 million on planning, building and operating integrated public transport networks in more than thirteen cities in the country. The major cities of Johannesburg and Cape Town have already constructed over 20 kilometres of dedicated bus lanes. Both cities will expand operations to carry up to 100 thousand passengers a day on each system, while the bus rapid transport system in Joh
October 2, 2013 Read time: 2 mins
Speaking at the launch of South Africa’s 2013 Transport Month, Transport Minister Dipuo Peters pledged to spend more than US$500 million on planning, building and operating integrated public transport networks in more than thirteen cities in the country.

The major cities of Johannesburg and Cape Town have already constructed over 20 kilometres of dedicated bus lanes. Both cities will expand operations to carry up to 100 thousand passengers a day on each system, while the bus rapid transport system in Johannesburg is also set to expand. A second phase is to open in the next two weeks, providing a link between hospitals, universities and sports facilities in the city.

"One of the instruments that we are looking at is the intermodal automated ticketing system that would then allow for integration of the different transport and networks," said the transport minister.

Peters praised the country’s road network, but admitted that maintenance of the roads does not come cheap, saying the country needs to spend US$2.9 million a year on just maintaining them, but at the moment can only spend US$2.9 million on both maintenance and new construction

The minister also said that from 2015, the government will be looking at upgrading passenger trains through the Passenger Rail Agency of SA (Prasa), and US$1.2 million will also be pumped into rehabilitating coaches and the signalling system.

Related Content

  • August 9, 2022
    PTV strengthens South Africa link
    Closer ties with Stellenbosch University support a new traffic management project
  • November 14, 2017
    West Midlands pilots the UK’s first MaaS
    Mobility-as-a-Service is being piloted in the UK’s second largest metropolitan area and will shortly be opened to the travelling public. A fully operational Mobility-as-a-Service (MaaS) offering is being piloted in the West Midlands region of the UK. Covering seven local authorities which make up the West Midlands metropolitan area and population of 2.8 million, the service is being provided through a memorandum of understanding (MOU) between Transport for West Midlands (TfWM), Finnish company MaaS Global
  • December 16, 2013
    Smart phones offer smarter way to pay for travel
    David Crawford reviews developments in near field communications for mass transit payments. ‘A carefully-designed and well-implemented mobile near field communications (NFC) solutions can give passengers a compelling experience that will encourage them to make greater use of public transport.’ That was the confident conclusion of a recent joint White Paper drawn up by the International Association of Public Transport and the global mobile operators’ representative group GSMA.
  • May 4, 2016
    Priority boosts ridership and cuts congestion
    Transit priority is proving a win-win in Europe and Australia. David Crawford reports. Technology that integrates with the Australian-originated Sydney Coordinated Adaptive Traffic System (SCATS) is driving bus signal priority and performance analysis initiatives on both sides of the world; in its homeland, with a major deployment in 2015, and in the capital of the Republic of Ireland.