Over the next five years the City of Cape Town will integrate a transport plan that will link many communities to the CBD.
|||Cape Town - Capetonian commuters spent between 40 percent and 70 percent of their monthly income on public transport, compared with the international norm of between 5 and 10 percent.
As a result the city was moving towards an integrated transport plan that would make user access a priority, said Melissa Whitehead, the commissioner of transport for Cape Town.
The integrated transport plan, which was approved by the mayoral committee on Tuesday, will form the basis of the city’s public transport projects and budget allocation for these undertakings for the next five years. And a key issue is continued investment opportunities for the taxi industry.
The city’s negotiations with the taxi industry as part of the roll-out of the Integrated Rapid Transit (IRT) service had been far from smooth, Whitehead said.
Despite a target of December, work on the N2 Express service that will link Mitchells Plain and Khayelitsha with the city centre will start only in July next year. The city said it took longer than expected to get all the relevant taxi operators and associations on board, and more time was needed to train them.
In a report submitted to Transport for Cape Town, Achmat Dyason said on behalf of the Western Province minibus taxi industry: “The manner in which the consultation and ultimately the contracting took place for Phase 1 is a matter that continues to blot the track record of the city and the lessons learnt should be used to promote equity and fairness going forward.”
The city has resolved to do direct, indirect and partial economic impact studies of its transport plans.
The transport plan will be valid until the end of the 2018/19 financial year, but will be reviewed at the start of the 2014/15 period.
Brett Herron, the mayoral committee member for transport for Cape Town, said the plan was the culmination of two years of work.
Once the plan is approved by the full council it goes to the Western Cape Provincial Government and the National Minister of Transport for their sign-off.
anel.lewis@inl.co.za
Cape Argus