The member of the mayoral committee for transport, Christine Walters, said the Johannesburg Roads Agency, in partnership with the provincial department of roads and transport, will jointly invest R122-million in massive infrastructure upgrades, new developments and accelerated expansions of the roads leading to the terminal. “This is the roads infrastructure connecting Africa’s largest inland port,” said Walters.
The investment is over and above the R900 million that state-owned logistics and rail entity Transnet will spend over the next few years on the freight terminal. The Transnet upgrade will result in the modernisation of the inland container terminal to handle increased volumes of operations,” she said.
She added that with the nearest seaport in Durban, which is about 500km away, the importance of the City Deep Freight Hub to the regional economy was far-reaching and it was key to forwarding and clearing the hub of goods to the rest of Africa, It is connected by major rail and road infrastructure links. However, these existing links have limited capacities. “This is an invaluable investment to ensure the largest container depot in the country runs optimally.
“The roads upgrades and expansions will increase the efficiency and decrease the cost of containerised cargo moving in and out of the city by ensuring a better flow of freight traffic and linkages with national highways.”
Meanwhile the agency’s head of infrastructure development, >Mpho >Kau said the roads upgrade programme will include several interrelated roads infrastructure projects along links leading to the terminal. >Kau said, “We anticipate construction on these projects to commence later in the financial year. The projects are implemented in partnership with South African National Roads Agency Limited.”
