Cape Town to take "ownership" of taxi routes

[duncan drennan]

It looks like Cape Town is planning to take over the taxi routes,

Cape Town's ailing public-transport system is set for a dramatic overhaul as the state "takes ownership" of taxi routes, the Cape Times reported on its website on Tuesday.

The number of trains are to increase from 80 to 108, bus subsidies will be raised from R350-million to R500-million and the minibus taxi industry will be integrated into the public transport system.

--

Regarding the taxi industry, Fransman said this would be transformed "from being unregulated to regulated, from being unlawful to lawful, from a lack of tax compliance to tax compliant".

Currently, taxi routes do not belong to government, and the taxi industry dictates who will operate on certain routes.

"We have to turn that around. We must make sure that the state takes ownership of the routes."

Full article, "Cape Town plans to take 'ownership' of taxi routes" on M&G

There has recently been a rise in taxi violence in the Cape. In the long run this seems like a good thing, but I am concerned about the taxi industry fighting this is violent way, or causing large scale disruption to public transport.

May the CT government be able to manage this well.

[Dave A]

Best of luck. This looks like skipping the easy ones.

The taxi recapitalisation program seems to be on crawl....