Bus Rapid Transit system on road to nowhere in Gauteng
The government has admitted that the R15bn Gauteng Bus Rapid Transit (BRT) system has been a mammoth flop‚ with commuters shunning the system in favour of taxis and conventional buses. In his opening speech at the four-day Southern African Transport Conference in Pretoria on Monday, Transport Minister Joe Maswanganyi told delegates that the buses were running empty and that the government needed to rethink the system. "We are acknowledging, as the Department of Transport, that there are challenges with BRT system, and we will review the system‚ look at it and come with the solution that will be to the best interest of commuters and government‚" he said. The minister said the buses were beautiful‚ clean and fully operational in the metros, but commuters were just not coming on board. He said they would scale it down‚ if need be‚ so that money could be redirected to where it was needed most. "We have to rethink how we redesign the BRT system, so that it does not continue to drain mone...
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