Contextually specific or relevant knowledge of paratransit/minibus-taxi operations in Cape Town remains limited and unsystematic, although there is a fairly well-established international literature on paratransit systems and the problems they engender in terms of formal regulation and/or incorporation into rationalised and integrated public transport networks. With regards to current efforts to revitalise the city’s public transport system through the planned introduction of bus rapid transit and the corporatisation of paratransit, there appears to have been little effort mounted locally directed specifically at investigating or considering alternatives.
It is important to develop a more adequate understanding of what constraints current efforts to incorporate minibus-taxi operators in a far-reaching transformation of the public transport system will encounter, and of how these might be addressed through formulating a different approach to the process of engagement and negotiation. The overarching aim of the project is therefore to provide informed input to public and multilateral stakeholder discussions regarding the role to be played by minibus-taxi operations – and by formal bus and rail service operators, as well as the relevant authorities – in the proposed transformation of Cape Town’s public transport system.
The project furthermore aims to develop an understanding of the operational dynamics, organisational and regulatory structures and practices of the city’s diverse minibus-taxi sector. It is also the intention with this project to identify and strategically assess the implications of possible alternative configurations of a transformed public transport system in terms of their ‘implementational feasibility’, with specific consideration of current and anticipated institutional and funding constraints.
Project leader: A/Prof Roger Behrens
Centre for Transport Studies, University of Cape Town
