With movement restrictions especially on inter-provincial travel during the lockdown, most South Africans saved on the kilometres travelled and the hours spent on the road.
During the first month of the lockdown, according to anonymised vehicle tracking data aggregated by Tracker, reduced use of passenger vehicles saved on average, 1 150km of driving, 30 hours on the road and R1 350 in fuel. This was compared to the average kilometres driven, time spent on the road and money spent on fuel during the month prior to lockdown.
Michael du Preez, Executive: Product and Marketing at Tracker South Africa says people who travelled more before the lockdown, stood to gain greater savings than those with lower mileage. “On average, passenger vehicles previously travelling less than 500km per month saved four hours of time on the road and R100 in fuel, while those with a typical mileage of 1 500km to 2 000km per month saved 40 hours in drive time and R1 800 on fuel,” he said.
In terms of time spent on the road and getting from point A to point B because of quieter roads, motorists’ benefits varied across municipalities in South Africa. Cape Town, Du Preez says, experienced the biggest time-saving of 36 hours, followed by Johannesburg and Polokwane at 33 hours, then Tshwane, Ekurhuleni and eThekwini at 31 hours, and Rustenburg at 28 hours.
“Across the country, the trend during lockdown was greater use of smaller vehicles, particularly by households with more than one vehicle. In Johannesburg. The shift was from 65% before lockdown to 70% during lockdown, while Durban experienced a similar shift from 66% to 70%. Tshwane went from 58% to 62% and Cape Town, which has the greatest use of smaller vehicles, shifted from 71% to 73%,” Du Preez explains.
As many vehicles stood idle during lockdown, motorists saved on time and money during this period but were also unable to take advantage of savings from the record fuel price decrease in April, which was close to R2 per litre for petrol and more than R1 per litre for diesel.
While many private individuals might not have been able to take advantage of this decrease, the drop might have provided some relief to a few commercial operators, says Linda Reid, Head of Data for Lightstone. Reid says while not enough to make a substantial difference to the negative economic impact of the lockdown for companies, perhaps this was helpful in containing costs for some.
Distances travelled by panel vans are down from 2 350km to 750km, while distances travelled by trucks are down from 3 100km to 1100km. The impact on small businesses can be clearly seen in the distances driven by bakkies, which are down from 2 200km to 700km, she concludes.
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