A campaign to have taxis in South Africa’s Kwazulu Natal province fitted with electronic fare collection metres began Monday. Around 3000 cabs are set to be installed with the gadget, according to a source.
The project aims to cover all taxis in the southern African country. It will cover Grange and Westgate, Ridge Park, Buffer, KwaNyamazane, Alexandra Road Extension, Richmond Crest, Pelham, France and Napierville areas, and later extended to the District of uMgungundlovu.
Translog Management is carrying out the project in partnership with Ctrack, a DigiCore associate. Ctrack will employ its Tap-I-Fare electronic fare collection meters inside the taxis and commuters over a period of two years.
According to Pierre Bruwer, MD of Tap-I-Fare, DigiCore’s associate company, their Tap-I-Fare Ctrack technology enables and supports the convenience and safety factors around electronic fare collection for both the owner and commuter.
Bruwer says the project will be rolled out to other provinces shortly.
The firms also partnered with Absa and MasterCard whose gadgets, they suggest, meet all government and legislative requirements.
There are close to 37000 taxis in the uMgungundlovu Regional Taxi Council registered to some 40 Taxi Associations.
The taxis take cash from its more than 500,000 passengers daily although according to Boy Zondi, chairman of the uMgungundlovu Regional Taxi Council, the time has come for South African commuters and citizens to see the taxis as “safe, affordable, convenient and eco-friendly.”
Zondi says the SA taxi industry has grown over the years and the District of uMgungundlovu is proud to be among the first in the country to benefit from the project.
He adds that the project will see the implementation of controls and rewards for good driving behaviour — to bring safety within the taxi industry.
The cash-based payment system has become hard to manage, says taxi owners who are now putting hope in the new system. The system is just a beginning of a new control regime in the industry. The taxi owners will reign their control over undisciplined drivers and monitor their movements and behaviour.
While addressing Parliament’s Transport Portfolio Committee in Cape Town earlier this year, Transport Minister Sibusiso Ndebele said: “People must value life. It cannot be considered normal that every month we count no less than 1,000 soul-less bodies due to road crashes, most of which could have been avoided.”
