No toll roads resolution in sight

Johannesburg - The South African National Roads Agency (Sanral) is on a collision course with its political master over toll roads.

Jeremy Cronin, Deputy Minister of Transport, says the Sanral issue is a case of the tail starting to wag the dog – also in respect of the controversial Gauteng toll project.

“We have made a huge mess,” he said. People have been driving on the road free of charge for a year.

Engineers had gone with the flow, said Cronin. “We have to respect them, but also ask questions.”

He said politicians had failed and consultants doing viability studies should have known better. (The decision to levy tolls on the roads was taken years ago, before Cronin and Minister Sibusiso Ndebele took over the reins of the country's transport systems.)

Cronin said Sanral had mistakenly been permitted to determine priorities with regard to expenditure itself. This should have taken place at government level.

Last week Sanral announced the preferred bidder for the N1/N2 Winelands toll road, despite an instruction from Ndebele to hold fire in respect of toll roads. The contract includes a 26-year toll-road concession. If the toll-road concession is taken out of the contract the tender process is expected to have to start from scratch. This could send shock waves through the construction community and international partners, such as the French construction giant, Bouygues.

Cape Town is busy with an urgent court application to prevent Sanral converting the route into a toll road.

Cronin indicated that the government was also unhappy about the plans. Check what the money will be spent on, he said.

He explained that two of the biggest expenses were for diverting the road through the Strand and Somerset West, and building the second Huguenot Tunnel.

Cronin said the road currently runs through the town, which has a couple of traffic lights. The idea is to convert the road into a freeway all the way.

To do so, a couple of thousand families will need to be moved from the Lwandle squatter camp, as will a number of smaller communities. These people will have to be provided with alternative housing.

That, said Cronin, would have to be done by Cape Town, which is opposing the project in court.

“Tremendous social challenges are involved merely to allow traffic to move a little faster. It’s a poor argument,” said Cronin.

The second major expense is the building of the second tunnel: Was this really the main priority for the Western Cape, he asked.

Sanral says the roads have reached the end of their design lifetime, but that does not mean that these two elements are essential, he said. “If tolling is necessary to fund maintenance...perhaps.”

Cronin said one problem is that Sanral itself appoints consultants to conduct feasibility and impact studies. Consultants are then inclined to say what their client wants to hear. These directives must come from government. Sanral’s outstanding technical skills and project-management ability should nevertheless be utilised, said Cronin.

The University of Cape Town (UC) and international consultants Arup conducted research for the Gauteng project. Cronin called it “useless” research.

He said there were other UC departments with far greater expertise, and why these had not been commissioned was unclear.

He said Arup should have known that thousands of global studies have shown  that traffic congestion is not resolved by widening roads. That aggravates the problem in the medium term, because better roads attract more vehicles.

Cronin reckons there should be a broader search for a solution. Trains and improved public transport, as well as good town planning, would in his view offer a better solution.

In Gauteng most trips take place intra- and not inter-city, as shown by earlier research. The Gautrain is intended for inter-city passenger transport. To spend R20bn on widening the freeways was, in his view, the wrong decision. It benefits only the middle class.

Cronin said Sanral chief executive Nazir Alli is, like Gautrain boss Jack van der Merwe, technically highly competent and able to present a good case.

In the case of Sanral the organisation itself raises the money for its projects by issuing bonds.

The two “are very convincing but small rural communities do not have any Jack van der Merwes or Nazir Allis. Priorities need to be determined politically.”

So far only 185km of a total 600km of the Gauteng Freeway Improvement Project has been completed.

Government’s approach is currently that the debt for the first phase has been incurred and needs to be paid for by tolls.

Plans to enforce tolling however are still vague and an amendment to the law is required to give Sanral the necessary authority. Cronin doubts whether the amendment will be ready in time to come before parliament before year-end.

If Sanral consequently fails to meet the planned February introduction date, an untenable situation could arise with the debt growing without revenue to cover it.

The thorny problem now resides with government and the presidential infrastructure committee needs to give direction.

But Cronin is adamant: benefits for the whole community are the future target. The politicians will see to this.