Assessing transport for 2010
12 July 2006
Representatives of South Africa's transport sector have gathered at the CSIR centre in Pretoria for the 25th annual Southern African Transport Conference, which will assess SA's transport infrastructure and systems ahead of the 2010 Fifa Football World Cup.
With the theme 2010: Will Transport Infrastructure and Systems be Ready?, the four-day conference, set to end on Thursday, has attracted policy- and decision-makers, academics, researchers, students and professionals working in the planning, construction, manufacturing, logistics, operation and safety of passenger and freight transport as well as road traffic.
Conference organiser André Heydenrych said the event's main aim was to provide a platform for the sharing of knowledge among delegates.
"After 1994 knowledge transfer has become more important because of the huge influx of new people without experience into the sector," he said.
He said while South Africa's
infrastructure may be lacking in comparison to that of Germany, the 2010 event would present the transport sector with a number of challenges and opportunities.
"Although there are huge gaps if you compare infrastructure here with that in Germany - such as stadia and the public transport system - many delegates think we will be able to host a successful World Cup,"he said.
"At the end of the conference we hope to have infused optimism in the delegates and make them aware of the opportunities that will be made available in the sector in the run up to the event."
Heydenrych said transport planning for 2010 was being improved by the construction of the Gautrain rapid rail link and the Department of Transport's taxi recapitalisation programme (TRP), an ambitious plan to upgrade the country's public transport fleet of minibus taxis.
"The TRP will also prove to be a huge advantage to our 2010 planning," he said. "The advantage with taxis is their flexibility; they
will be able to take people to match venues and straight back to their accommodation."
Valuable lessons
Transport department acting director-general Jerry Makokoane said at the conference on Tuesday that Germany's success in hosting the 2006 World Cup had taught South Africa valuable lessons.
He said South African officials who had visited Germany before and during the event now had a "treasure trove" of information about what South Africa, with its unique circumstances, could do to stage a successful tournament.
In addition, help from Fifa and new knowledge gained from the 2008 Olympics in Beijing would ensure South Africa remained on track with its preparations.
Makokoane said that while problems remained with South Africa's public transport system, some gains had been made. The system currently transports 39.7% of the population to work every day, 85% of whom were found in metropolitan and urban areas. Some 36.2% use
private transport, and 52.3% non-motorised transport.
He said minibus taxis, as an informal public transport system, made up 67.9% of public transport trips.
"This highlights the important role that a well-managed minibus taxi system can play as the core focus of public transportation, and the new transportation subsidy regime of government is shifting towards the direction of supporting this sector."
The use of public transport is highest in Gauteng and KwaZulu-Natal, where more than half the people used public transport to travel to work. Three of the stadiums set to host the 2010 finals - Soccer City, Ellis Park and Loftus Versfeld - are in Gauteng, each not further than 10km from a city centre.
South Africa is building five new stadiums for the 2010 tournament, and upgrading a number of existing ones.
"This creates an opportunity for those provincial and city governments to concentrate on the provision of transport services to these single
venues," Makokoane said.
"The host cities are world-renowned for hosting international events and have sound financial bases and strong sports and political leadership."
He said the existing transport system had coped well with previous international events hosted by South Africa, such as the 1995 Rugby World Cup and the 2003 Cricket World Cup.
"Almost every other week, there is an international conference of one form or another in South Africa, and we have not experienced transportation problems," he said.
He cited issues such as planning, aviation, infrastructure engineering and the environment as some of the issues the government was working on, issues to be discussed during the course of the conference.
SouthAfrica.info reporter and BuaNews
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