Awaiting completion of all studies
Alan Peat
A MAJOR meeting has just been held in Pretoria between the private sector road transport industry and representative bodies, and the Gauteng provincial transport authorities (Gautrans) - on the contentious subject of the proposed truck ban on Gauteng freeways during peak hours.
“The transport industry put its problems to Gautrans,” Carol O’Brien, transport policy specialist at the SA Chamber of Business (Sacob), told FTW.
“The main proposal was that the ban should not be imposed until all the studies are completed.”
A second proposal was that software, from which models of the transport system can be displayed on a PC, be used for monitoring and controlling traffic flows.
“However,” said O’Brien, “both these points were inconclusive - with Gautrans not being able to give any final decision.”
But part of this delay in getting an answer is an economic study currently being done by Urban Econ for Gautrans, she said.
“The purpose is an economic impact assessment on keeping heavy vehicles confined to the left hand lane of freeways during peak hours, as is currently the test case - and a total ban during these periods of the day,” said Urban Econ project manager, Ben van der Merwe.
The company is currently doing a number of surveys leading up to the compilation of the assessment report, but Van der Merwe told FTW that there was, as yet, no indication in which direction the final findings would go.
The following step is to computerise the incoming input, he added, and to create a simulation model from these findings.
While he suggested that the time frame was tight, Van der Merwe expects the surveys to be completed by the middle of this month; the computerisation to be conducted between mid-February and mid-March; and the final report submitted to Gautrans by end-March.
This fits with the original timing for the long-term strategy, which Gautrans announced would be implemented by April.
However, it is likely that the various factors highlighted in the authorities’ original description of
the long-term strategy could be considerably altered given the current situation.
Long-term strategy
l To continue to study international best practice of implementing a ban on heavy vehicles on freeways in Gauteng during peak periods;
l To continue to investigate the impact of the proposed ban;
l To continue to engage all role-players;
l To use data received from the first phase to determine the benefits and disadvantages of the strategy - especially the results achieved in reducing congestion, which
has been estimated to cost the economy over R1.5-billion a year.
The authorities may very well feel that most of these conditions have now been met, with two previous studies also having been done by Arup for Gautrans, and the CSIR (Council for Scientific and Industrial Research) for the private sector, and the economic impact study due for completion soon.
It might be fair to speculate that the final results from Urban Econ could very well decide the question of whether to ban, or not to ban.
