Transport and Public Works

(a) The Department of Transport and Public Works recognises its critical role in ensuring that the public transport sector responds appropriately to the Covid-19 pandemic. Public transport remains a key service that must be provided, even over the lockdown period, considering the need to transport those providing and accessing essential services.

The DTPW, working with other stakeholders in the province, has developed and is implementing several initiatives to prevent the spread of the Covid-19 virus on public transport. These initiatives are described below:

1. Ensuring social distancing at public transport stations and on vehicles – DTPW is ensuring social distancing by strictly enforcing the vehicle loading regulations published by the Department of Transport (DOT). DTPW has established an effective monitoring mechanism, based on a team of on-the-ground surveyors who are monitoring the adherence to loading regulations at stations and ranks in the Cape Metropolitan Area. The team provides real-time reporting of non-compliance by transport operators such as taxis and subsidised bus services e.g. Golden Arrow Bus Services (GABS), allowing Traffic Law Enforcement to take immediate action to hold these operators accountable for contravening loading regulations. DTPW is ensuring that other operators such as vehicle operating companies (VOCs) operating services such as Go George comply with loading restrictions to ensure social distancing on public transport.

Also, Provincial Traffic Services is enforcing the vehicle loading restrictions at several roadblocks and setting up vehicle check points (VCPs) at strategic locations.

Besides enforcing loading regulations, the DTPW is working with public transport operators to ensure that enough capacity is provided to reduce the risk of overloading. The Department is constantly engaging the industry to provide enough vehicles to meet demand.

So far, the above measures have meant that few cases have been reported of failure to adhere to loading regulations. On average, these cases have made up 6% of the critical minibus taxi risk factors reported daily and an average of 1% of cases reported for other bus services.

In addition to monitoring loading of vehicles, the DTPW is educating passengers about other social distancing measures, including maintaining safe distances when standing in public transport queues.

2. Cleaning and environmental control in vehicles and at stations – sanitising public transport vehicles and facilities is one of the ways that the spread of Covid-19 can be prevented. The DTPW is working with stakeholders, such as the City of Cape Town, to ensure that facilities are regularly cleaned and sanitised.

In addition, DTPW is providing hand sanitisers, masks and gloves to public transport operators, including GABS, MyCiTi and the minibus taxi industry. DTPW has also coordinated the distribution of additional supplies provided by the National Government.

3. Promoting strict hygiene among passengers and service providers – the DTPW has put measures in place to ensure personal hygiene on public transport. These measures include the provision of hand sanitiser at public transport facilities and face masks for taxi drivers and marshals. In addition, the DTPW, through its monitoring system, is collecting information on the availability of hand sanitiser and the use of masks by drivers and marshals to proactively address shortages and the risk of non-compliance.

4. Educating passengers and service providers – the DTPW is supporting awareness campaigns targeted at passengers and service providers. These campaigns are aimed at promoting personal hygiene and social distancing at public transport facilities and on vehicles. In addition, the campaigns are being used to advise people to avoid unnecessary travel.

5. Ongoing monitoring of Covid-19/public health risk factors – a data-driven approach is at the centre of the DTPW’s public transport response to Covid-19. As mentioned in the sections above, the Department has a team that does real time monitoring and reporting of risk factors, allowing officials to proactively develop measures to address these factors. Besides real-time monitoring, the Department tracks occurrences over time to identify trends and make fact-based decisions and refine its response strategy. The Department has invested in suitable technology platforms to make this monitoring possible.

Also, DTPW responds to transport issues that arise in the various districts and that are reported through the Joint Operating Committee (JOC) established to coordinate Covid-19 responses.

(b)Provincial Traffic Services is included with emergency personnel and security services as an essential service and as a secondary law enforcement partner to the South African Police Service (SAPS). Its mandate is to ensure that road users comply with Disaster Management Act Regulations, including but not limited to controlling the movement of road users on the province’s major road network, including those road users providing frontline and essential services.

The enforcement of the transport regulations for the lockdown has two (2) parts that are complementary and described below:

1. Enforcement at stations and ranks – currently, this is being done through ongoing monitoring by a team of surveyors who staff these facilities. Although this team does not perform enforcement activities such as the issuing fines, it provides important intelligence that enables Provincial Traffic Services to respond to cases of non-compliance. The team monitors all aspects of the lockdown regulations such as loading requirements, operating hours and the use of personal protective equipment e.g. masks.

2. Enforcement on the road – whilst monitoring at stations and ranks helps, certain non-compliance could occur after taxis or buses have left these facilities. In addition, other issues such as the movement across provinces require monitoring and enforcement. As part of planned joint interventions to achieve its objectives, Provincial Traffic Services is providing resources at six (6) fixed cross border and seventeen (17) secondary vehicle check points (VCPs) that are located at strategic points. Also, Provincial Traffic Services is deploying normal patrol officers to monitor driver behaviour to enforce compliance. In addition, these officers are monitoring all secondary routes to mitigate the risk of roadblock and vehicle check point avoidance.

These roadblocks and vehicle check points have been effective, not only in enforcing transport regulations, but in the fight against other offences such as the transportation of non-essential goods

In addition, the province has an extensive Automated Number Plate Recognition (ANPR) camera network, that is helping in the monitoring of vehicles. This is useful in monitoring travel times and movement to other provinces.

In addition, the DTPW is investigating the possibility of providing a technology platform that enables passengers to report contraventions. Although this is a longer-term initiative, if developed successfully, the technology will enable passengers to send feedback regarding non-compliance using ordinary cell phones to a control centre where such information will be used by traffic law enforcement to develop initiatives to improve compliance.

(c) Measures to enforce lockdown regulations have so far focused on taxi ranks and bus stations, considering that train services are not operating during the lockdown and the regulations do not have an impact on rail services.

As described in the paragraphs above, on-the-ground monitoring at the taxi ranks and bus stops, supported by a technology platform for real time communication is the main way that the DTPW is enforcing lockdown regulations at these facilities.

The Department deploys a team of surveyors to the public transport facilities in the morning and in the afternoon. These surveyors use mobile devices to record cases of non-compliance and send these to a staffed control centre and a central dashboard/database that gets updated in real time. Cases of non-compliance with the regulations are identified in real time, allowing traffic law enforcement to respond appropriately.

In addition, at the end of the day, all cases reported are summarised in a report sent to DTPW Top Management. This informs decisions on potential areas of improvement.

(d) The DTPW has developed a robust strategy to respond to COVID-19 and support the implementation of the lockdown regulations. In addition, this strategy ensures that public transport services are available to essential workers. The strategy is based on three (3) main pillars described below:

1. Institutions – successfully developing and implementing responses to Covid-19 challenges requires coordination among several stakeholders in the province. Considering this, clear institutional mechanisms that specify roles and responsibilities for stakeholders are essential. The DTPW has established a Covid-19 Priority Committee to coordinate its responses. The Committee brings officials from the Department’s strategic, operational and law enforcement branches together. In addition, the Committee coordinates with other stakeholders such as the City of Cape Town, the South African Police Service and the province’s Disaster Management Centre (DMC). So far, coordination of the Western Cape’s responses has been effective and few cases of non-compliance have been reported.

2. Technology for monitoring and evaluation – ongoing monitoring of compliance with regulations is essential in ensuring that the lockdown regulations are implemented successfully. The Department has successfully implemented a data-driven approach to monitoring the implementation of lockdown regulations. This is based on real-time monitoring of transport services to ensure that operators are complying with the regulations. As mentioned in the sections above, the Department has a team that does on-the-ground monitoring of compliance with regulations. The team reports on issues of non-compliance in real time, allowing traffic law enforcement to take measures to address cases of non-compliance.

3. Operational excellence – Due to the seriousness of the nation-wide threat, a softer approach was needed to perform traffic law enforcement during this period in a concerted effort to minimise contact with other persons. Directives were drafted and communicated to all Traffic Chiefs and operational staff to immediately suspend all breath alcohol screening of drivers when conducting drinking and driving interventions.

The weighing of vehicles was suspended for the duration of lockdown. However, the Western Cape weighbridge sites were earmarked to be utilised as round-the-clock vehicle check points and are accessible to all role-players at short notice to conduct checks and searches of heavy and other motor vehicles to determine consignment loads and the legitimacy of movement.

Provincial Traffic Service’s buddy system and stop and approach were revised for general patrol duties, by using two patrol vehicles, each with one officer and within reasonable proximity to each other, patrolling simultaneously in the same direction. This allows officers to support one another and improves the area covered by the officers. Not more than one officer per vehicle is being deployed.

As part of a strategic and tactical approach and deployment, it was necessary to ensure that there was enough staff on duty to render an effective service over this period. This necessitated a change in the normal eight-hour (8) daily shifts to (12) twelve-hour daily shifts to provide round-the-clock service.

Provincial Traffic Services reclassified all operational staff for the during the nation-wide lockdown to include all Traffic Chiefs, Principal Provincial Inspectors, Senior Provincial Inspectors and Provincial Inspectors.

Provincial Traffic Services has daily representatives at the Provincial SAPS JOC, all five Regional Cluster JOCs and the Disaster Management Centre to keep abreast of all developments, and any adjustments to operational mandates during this period.