Get out of your car, get into a taxi!

A while back, about 4 years ago, I was lucky enough to hitch a ride to the Australian Formula One Grand Prix. It was an awesome experience, one that I will always cherish. One of the major reasons I had a good time is that I was able to get to the racing circuit, some 10km distance from my hotel, easily, to and fro. Australia has a good tram system which for the purposes of the F1 GP, had exclusive entry and exit stations to ferry people around who are going to the circuit exclusively. It would pick us up about 200 metres from the hotel and drop us off about 20 metres from the circuit. Much like the recent Olympics in Greece.

Do we have a tram system? No, Jozi and other towns had trams back in the day, but not anymore. So how are we going to transport people who have come here to watch the FIFA World Cup in 2010 without any hiccups? Show them to the nearest taxi rank perhaps? I hear “Gautrain Gautrain” but what about those living in Polokwane, in Cape Town, P.E, in Durban? Buses maybe? On a short visit to Amsterdam in 2005 I used trams again, getting around was easy, even the last tram I took at about 10pm was still running and on time. Our public transport system seriously needs an overhaul.

This is why I don’t understand the new craze of local and provincial government to stop the public from buying new cars. Those of us who are of darker hue and/or frizzled natural hair will know that from the very first day you start working, your goal is to buy your own car and get out of the taxi system. The government should know this. Yet in Gauteng the craze is to get the public to use public transport more by creating, out of the existing “fast lanes” on the freeway, a dedicated lane to motorists who carry three or more passengers in their vehicles. Three or more. That’s a taxi. If you are used to travel alone you’ll suddenly have to invite a few others to join you everyday so you can give them a lift to and from work. This experiment was carried out last year on Africa’s busiest freeway, the N1 between Jozi and Pretoria, and it caused a lot of anguish to those who travel solo. Is the government itself trying to sabotage the good work done by the Department of Trade and Industry via the MIDP in encouraging lower vehicle costs and thus affordability for those who have never owned cars before?

It gets worse. Lately traffic lights have appeared on busy on and offramps near the freeways. What clear logic is there in these? I honestly can’t see how a traffic light that stops you on the onramp as you are about to join the freeway, can help ease traffic congestion. Maybe I’m just a foolish motorist.

Worse still, a few toll gates have been proposed on popular freeways around Gauteng. These include places like offramps near New Road in Midrand, the offramp near Buccleuch etc. In fact, what is being proposed is something like this, according to the South African National Roads Agency’s (SANRAL) advertisements over the past weekend:

The N1 between the Golden Highway South and the Allandale interchange in Midrand would have 10 tollgates, five on each side of the freeway.
The section of the N1 from the New Road interchange in Midrand to the Lynnwood road interchange in Pretoria will take about 7 tollgates.
The N12 would have a total of nine tollgates. The part of the road stretching between Gillooly’s there by EastGate Mall and the border between Gauteng and Mpumalanga would have five tollgates.
The section of the N12 from the Diepkloof interchange in Soweto to the Reading interchange in Alberton would have a total of 4 tollgates.
The N3 between the Buccleuch interchange in northern Johannesburg and Heidelberg road, southeast of the city, could have 8 tolls, four on each side of the road.
The N4 would have two toll plazas.

Therefore if you work in Pretoria and live in the south, you could find yourself paying over 8 times in toll fees. And that is just going ONE WAY! The system will use prepaid cards that you buy so you don’t have to stop all the time to slide a credit card or pay cash.

The public, that is you and I, have a chance to comment on these proposed developments before the closing date of the 14th November 2007. I suggest we do.