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The City of Cape Town’s Urban Mobility Directorate has drafted a new Comprehensive Integrated Transport Plan (CITP), outlining the strategies and plans for the next five years – 2023 to 2028 – to improve transport in the city.
The new draft CITP takes into account the current and future state of public transport, such as the implosion of passenger rail, the impact of the Covid-19 pandemic and remote working on commuter demand and longer-term travel patterns, and climate change.
“Our ultimate goal is to ensure more residents have better access to opportunities, services, goods, experiences and information. This can be achieved through a range of affordable, efficient and safe transport options.
“Proximity to opportunities is also important so that commuters spend less time travelling or will be able to walk or cycle to destinations if possible,” said the city’s Mayoral Committee Member for Urban Mobility, Councillor Rob Quintas.
“The Covid-19 lockdown accelerated the shift to digital connectivity where many are opting to work from home or access services and other needs digitally instead of travelling. We need to consider this in our forward planning.
“The CITP supports the notion that public transport services and our road network should enable the efficient movement of people, goods and services so that our local economy can grow, we can attract investment, and improve our overall competitiveness as a business destination.
“The bigger our economy, the more jobs the private sector can provide, and with employment comes improved living conditions and standards, giving Capetonians hope for a better future,” Quintas said.
The new CITP also provides the current status quo of transport services in Cape Town, from demand to supply, inclusive of all transport infrastructure such as roads, walk and cycle lanes, minibus-taxi facilities and public transport interchanges, MyCiTi bus facilities, stops and stations, as well as information about the current public transport services – the minibus-taxi routes, MyCiTi routes, rail lines, and so forth.
Currently, up to 58% of commuters use private vehicles to get to their destinations; 22% use minibus-taxis; 9% bus services such as the MyCiTi and GABS; 2% use rail (a decline of 95% for the period 2012 – 2022); and nearly 10% walk.
The CITP also focuses on the city’s planned projects for the next five years and beyond to improve services and infrastructure, among which the roll-out of the MyCiTi service to the metro-south east, the construction of new minibus-taxi facilities, and road improvements to alleviate congestion on priority routes.
The CITP provides a detailed analysis of priorities, proposed expenditure over the medium-term and responses to longer-term systemic challenges, including:
- A growing travel demand from people with a small disposable income;
- Long travelling distances between lower income areas and places of work and opportunities;
- An underperforming passenger rail system;
- Poor integration between different modes of public transport under different management authorities or spheres of government;
- Inefficiencies within the minibus-taxi sector and MyCiTi bus service;
- Maintenance backlog related to the city’s road network, missing road links and traffic signal upgrades needed to improve traffic flow.
There is poor integration between the different modes of transport, which makes it difficult or impossible for commuters to transfer seamlessly between services. Also, given the implosion of passenger rail, more people are using road-based transport, which adds to operational and commuter costs, travelling time, congestion and CO2 emissions.
Then, those who cannot afford transport and need to walk or cycle to work are increasingly vulnerable to crime, said Quintas.
“We have learnt valuable lessons over the past five years, and we have included these in the CITP. We want to focus on areas and projects where we can make the biggest impact in the shortest possible time,” he said.
The draft CITP is now available for public comment until 30 November 2022.
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