Pretoria Bus Routes Maps Project still going well

Just an update on the above mentioned project as reported here, the project is going well but not as fast as I initially thought. However, October 31 is still our deadline. 


Visit the map below for an update;



View Pretoria/Tshwane  Bus Routes - Part of Mapping SA Cities' Public Transport Routes in a larger map

Gautrain marks 1 million passengers - a success or failure?

Last Wednesday, 22 September 2010 Gautrain reached its 1 million passengers mark since its inception few days before the FIFA World Cup. According to Gautrain, the milestone coincided almost exactly with 100 days of operation. It is not known if the 1 million is based on the number of passengers who made use of the train or the number of tickets bought. If it is the latter, then it should be a concern because we all know that not everyone who buys a ticket to the movies do not necessarily watch the movie.

Now, lets check how many people were transported (average) in each day the trains operated;

1 million/100 days = 10 000 average passengers per day. As expected, most of the passengers were carried during the World Cup when 400 000 passengers were carried between OR Tambo and Sandton in its first month. This translates to 13 000 average passengers carried per day in the first month.

With international trains carrying more passengers than what Gautrain is carrying currently, can this be considered to be a failure? Considering that it was estimated that 104 000 passengers per day will be carried and the link between Hatfield to Malboro and from Braamfontein to Sandton City is not yet operational, then one should not be quick to think that. Assuming that the average 10 000 passengers carried currently remains, the questions to be raised is whether the remaining lines will carry the remaining 94 000 passengers.

For now, I can not tell and we will have to wait until the line is built. But a quick guess tells me that the 94 000 passengers will be hard to be achieved. Here are the reasons why I think so;

• First, most South Africans just love being in their cars, so convincing them to get out of them to shared seats will be a mountain to climb even when roads are going to be tolled;
• I am not sure how many people get sponsored by the companies via car subsidies, but those who are will not leave their cars as new toll roads will be easily be absorbed;
• For those who will be burdened by toll roads will find alternative routes to avoid the toll roads - which lead to more damaged local roads (what are the local authority planning to do about this is not known) - see map below;

View New Roads to be Tolled and Alternative Routes in a larger map

But like I said before, one should wait for April 2011 (note: Gautrain's website list the operational date as 06/2011), when the second phase of the Gautrain is completed.

Pretoria Bus Routes Maps

This is the map City of Tshwane Bus Routes that I am designing together with a friend using their bus timetables. I hope we finish this by end of October. This came after realizing that the City don't have their transit map for either their buses or any other mode of transport. If successful, we will do the same for the City of Johannesburg. Wish us luck all.

View Pretoria/Tshwane Bus Routes - Part of Mapping SA Cities' Public Transport Routes in a larger map