Freight operators voice their concerns.

l Delays in loading / offloading vessels cause additional costs, and also a shift of freight onto road; l There is a shortage of locomotives and poor utilisation of rail wagons - including a short supply for empty containers - resulting in congestion and delays; l Rail tariffs promote the use of road rather than rail; l There is no synchronisation of operating times between terminals (DCT operates on a 24-hour basis, while City Deep operates from 06:00-17:00); l The need for the Department of Transport (DoT) and the Department of Public Enterprises (DPE) to have a common vision regarding the moving of freight from road to rail; l Slow turn-around of vessels; l Service level agreements (SLA) do not seem to work. Looking at City Deep and Pretcon the committee identified main problems at each. City Deep, according to the report, handles eight trains per day, and has the capacity to handle 2 400 containers per day but currently operates at 50% of capacity. Pretcon, meantime, only handles four trains per day and has the capacity to handle 1 000 containers per day. Again the freight operators expressed the concern that the current situation was not encouraging the use of rail. The constraints they highlighted to the committee were: l Quality of service is poor and not predictable; l Rail tariffs promote the use of road instead of rail - and 65 % of City Deep / Pretcon-bound containers are transported by road from the coast; l There is lack of capacity at Spoornet; l Operating hours of inland terminals need to be extended; l Constant changes in management cause a loss in experienced staff; l Spoornet needs to invest in new rolling stock and human resources; l Insufficient law enforcement of road transporters takes place; l Information on the Spoornet website is often incorrect; l There is insufficient planning on the part of Spoornet; l The motor industry volumes have grown by 56% while the infrastructure has remained the same.