The commuter rail network, centered around Cape Town Station, consists of four lines possessing a combined length of 581 km. Table 2-1 shows recent movements in the annual rail transportation volume.
The daily rail transportation volume works out to approximately 400,000 passengers per day, and the average trip length per passenger is roughly 17 km.
Table 2-1 Movements in the Metropolitan Region Rail Transportation Volume
2.3.4 Problems in the Current Urban Transport Situation
(1)Road Transport
Although much effort has been put in to developing road facilities in the past 10 years, supply has been unable to keep pace with the increased demand for road transport and, as a result, road congestion has become a serious problem throughout the metropolitan region. This congestion is most serious during the morning rush.
As a result of this, the average road traveling speed, which used to be 40 km/h in the 1980s, has dropped to 34 km/h in the 1990s.
Problems with the road network can be summed up into the following two points.
1)Approximately 85% of the road transport demand is concentrated into 63% of the road network centered around arterial roads, leading to criticism that efficient network utilization is being lost. Thus, corrective rerouting of the road network is an issue.
2)Poor traffic signal operation, etc. leads to inefficient traffic through-put at intersections.
