On November 10 Maputo officially moved 4.5 hours closer to KwaZulu-Natal with the opening of the Maputo-Catembe bridge.
Timed to coincide with the 131st anniversary of the designation of Maputo as a city, the Chinese-financed and built bridge forms part of a new logistics link from Maputo to the South African border at Kosi Bay.
The combination of the bridge and new tarred road has reduced the travelling time from Maputo to link up to the KwaZulu-Natal road to Durban from six hours in a 4x4 to 90 minutes with a standard saloon car.
Traffic congestion will also be relieved on the Maputo road linking the city of Maputo to the twin city of Matola, which is an important regional industrial and logistics hub. While the new link gives exporters and importers an alternative to the Komatipoort and Swaziland routes, cargo is unlikely to start flowing in large volumes until the Kosi Bay border post is upgraded.
At present it is not designed to handle large volumes of freight. Over half a kilometre long, the US$785-million Maputo-Catembe bridge is recognised as the longest suspension bridge in Africa.
