City bus routes come home 

by | May 22, 2015 | 2015 News

Brett Herron, mayoral committee member for transport, has announced new MyCiti routes, including to Mitchell’s Plain. PHOTO: curt lottring

Brett Herron, mayoral committee member for transport, has announced new MyCiti routes, including to Mitchell’s Plain. [PHOTO: curt lottring]

Plans are all set for two main routes of the MyCiti bus service to link Khayelitsha and Mitchell’s Plain to Claremont and Wynberg.

According to a statement by Brett Herron, mayoral committee member for transport, this plan comprises two ambitious main services and a network of 34 feeder routes. Collectively, these routes will traverse a considerable area of the city, touching the lives of nearly half of the residents of Cape Town.

The development of a design for the so-called “Lansdowne-Wetton corridor” is being presented to communities before detailed design work gets underway.

The first main route will transport commuters from Mitchell’s Plain to Claremont along a 25km route.

The second main route will transport commuters from Khayelitsha to Wynberg along a 35km route.

These two routes share an 8km segment, providing several transfer opportunities.

These two routes will extend from Chris Hani train station in Makhaza, Khayelitsha, along Govan Mbeki Road and Ottery Road to Wynberg, and from Kapteinsklip train station in Mitchell’s Plain, again along Govan Mbeki Road and along Lansdowne Road to Claremont.

These two main routes will cross a number of suburbs, including Philippi East, Ikwezi Park, Nonqubela, Khayelitsha CBD, Litha Park, Mandela Park, Harare, Kuyasa, Enkanini, Manenberg, Sweet Homes, Gugulethu, Brown’s Farm, Nyanga, Philippi, Crossroads, Wynberg, Plumstead, Royal Cape, Ottery East, Ottery, Turf Hall Estate, Lansdowne, Hanover Park, Lentegeur, Beacon Valley, Eastridge, Mitchell’s Plain CBD, Tafelsig, Claremont, Kenilworth, Ronde­bosch East, Kenwyn, Crawford and Wetton.

Most of these routes will take the form of a dedicated busway, or what we have come to know as the red road in Cape Town. On parts of the route, achieving this will require the use of the proclaimed road reserve.

In addition to the main routes, the design for this new MyCiti plan includes 34 feeder routes.

The draft plan has estimated 25 closed stations to be built on the main routes and 45 pairs of open stops. The draft plan for the feeder routes, which will criss-cross the area for the main service, will need 320 pairs of stops. This will take the City of Cape Town closer to its goal of ensuring that 80% of residents are within 500m of a public transport stop.

According to Herron Transport for Cape Town is committed to reducing the cost of the MyCiti transport as a priority for all households, particularly poor and working families who travel long distances to reach places of work. The City’s public transport plan aims to halve the cost of public transport in the coming decades.

All of this won’t happen overnight – Herron says it will take five years to get the next phase of MyCiTi development going.

“There will be major roadworks all along the routes, which will be disruptive. Some private property will unfortunately have to be expropriated – but this will be kept to a minimum.”

A range of public open days will be held from Friday to the end of June to inform residents along the proposed routes about the expansion of MyCiTi services in the new Lansdowne-Wetton corridor.

Source: http://www.news24.com/SouthAfrica/Local/Peoples-Post/City-bus-routes-come-home-20150518