Taxi industry demands part ownership of mooted transport scheme

While Eastern Cape premier Oscar Mabuyane welcomed Prasa’s multimillion-rand Motherwell railway system on Tuesday, taxi associations in Nelson Mandela Bay said they would not support the project unless they were included.

During his state of the province address in Bhisho, Mabuyane said the government was committed to improving the public transport system in the province, with R142m committed by Prasa for the project.

In 2014, The Herald reported that the first phase of the R1.5bn project would involve a new 7.8km railway line — with four  new stations — connecting Motherwell to the existing passenger line at Swartkops. The line runs between Port Elizabeth’s main station and Johannesburg.

The second phase involves a loop of about 11km that would link Motherwell with Coega.

Mabuyane said the R1.5bn investment from Prasa would be for the network extension covering the 7km line and four stations in the area of Motherwell, linking with the Port Elizabeth CBD.

“We need to do more in building an integrated public transport system, particularly on the work of shifting freight from road to rail, as this will address congestion on our roads and reduce the costs of travelling for our people,” Mabuyane said.

“Long-term plans are to link up the last station with the Coega Industrial Development Zone.”

The taxi associations in the Bay are vehemently opposed to the development, saying it would hamper their industry.

However, they said they would agree to the project if they had part ownership of the system.

Chair of the Nelson Mandela Bay Taxi Association — the umbrella body of all associations in the city — Songezo Mpanda said on Tuesday that the process should be inclusive to all the structures within the transport industry.

“We need proper consultation and explanation on this project because it will have financial implications or consequences for the taxi industry and the only reason we are fighting it is because no-one has actually sat us down and formerly communicated these plans to us,”  Mpanda said.

He was unable to outline the implications but said government did not subsidise the taxi industry and they could not support a project that sought to inject money or subsidise the railway system without all stakeholders having a part in decision-making.

Mabuyane said they remained mindful of the need to ensure that public and private transport systems were designed to enable people with disabilities to use the entire transport value chain without barriers.

“Accordingly, 50% of existing systems will be redesigned to be compliant with accessibility norms and standards across the transport value chain by 2024,” he said.

Mabuyane said the South African Road Agency Ltd (Sanral) would be rolling out multiple roads infrastructure projects in 10  critical trade routes across the province.

He said the national department of transport would inject R11.9bn in the next two years, with R5.4bn targeted for projects in Kirkwood, Addo, Port Elizabeth to East London, from Aliwal North to Lady Grey and Barkley East.

“I can also confirm today [Tuesday], that the long awaited upgrade of the road between Alice and Fort Beaufort will start in May 2020,” he said.

Mabuyane said there would be significant investments in public transport facilities to transform taxi ranks into economic transport nodes, and also build new ones, which would include market stalls for hawkers.

“Four inter-regional and intermodal public transport terminals will be established in Port Elizabeth, East London and Mthatha,”  Mabuyane said.