Still stuck in traffic
Since ditching his car in favour of Cape Town’s MyCiTi bus service to reach the city centre, banker Adriaan de Witt has been able to wake up an hour later each morning. “I can stay awake longer, sleep longer and do late-night work if I want,” he says. He’s one of thousands of city residents who now use Bus Rapid Transit (BRT) systems to escape growing congestion in SA’s cities.
The latest “State of SA Cities” report, which was released by the SA Cities Network in June, notes that congestion is worsening as private car use grows as a share of commuters’ main mode of transport in at least four cities.
It follows national treasury’s “2014 Expenditure Performance Review of SA’s Public Transport and Infrastructure Systems”, which revealed that car use outpaced all forms of public transport between 2003 and 2013, its share growing by almost six percentage points.
In a survey of members released in May by the Cape Chamber of Commerce & Industry, 85% of respondents said increased traffic congestion had demotivated staff and reduced productivity, while 90% said traffic congestion had increased transport costs. Over a quarter said their absentee rate had increased by 10%. Many blame the failing rail service.
“My staff are just as frustrated as I am and I am beyond frustrated because of the extremely poor service from ‘Metro Fail’,” said one disgruntled employer. “There has to be a better way.”
Perhaps there is.
On the surface of it, BRT systems might help. The use of separate bus lanes, minimal use of right turns, special access ramps, offplatform fare collection and separate exit and entrance doors on buses have reduced transit times.
Today more than 160 cities have such systems, according to Embarq, a programme of the World Resources Institute. They include Tshwane, Johannesburg and Cape Town. Construction of a BRT has started in eThekwini.
A 2013 Embarq report reveals that BRT users in Istanbul, Turkey, can save 52 minutes a day or 28 days a year by shifting from other transport modes to BRT.
In Johannesburg, Soweto residents using Rea Vaya — which began operating in 2009 — save an average of 13 minutes each way on daily commutes, based on a 2012 study by Christo Venter from the University of Pretoria’s Centre of Transport Development. He found commuters made time savings of between 10% and 20% using the bus service.
However, in a report released earlier this year (based on a 2014 survey by the City of Jo’burg of 1,200 residents), Venter found that more commuters value short walking times to stations and more frequent bus times over a faster service.
City planners, he says, should therefore focus on offering a more integrated service, adding that up to now attention has been directed more towards rolling out trunk routes than reaching more users.
The city’s earlier survey found that just half of road users were willing to switch to public transport if it was safer, more accessible and reliable. But Venter points out that passengers have a very low willingness to pay for such enhancements. This leaves government to cover most of the fare costs.
Currently, government subsidises over two-thirds of the price of a BRT fare, which is less than a municipal bus ticket (70%), but more than a rail pass (60%) and Gautrain ticket (43%), according to national treasury data.
While Venter reckons a subsidy covering two-thirds of the ticket price is not out of sync
‘‘ ROAD USERS MUST SHARE THE RESPONSIBILITY IN ALLEVIATING CONGESTION BY CHANGING THEIR TRAVEL PATTERNS BREET HERRON