Gauteng e-tolling gets the green light

Gauteng’s e-tolling system has been given the official go-ahead as SANRAL selectively drops tariff charges ahead of its roll-out, potentially before year-end.

Transport Minister Ben Martins today announced that Gauteng’s controversial e-tolling programme will be implemented with initial tolling tariffs published for public comment before final pricing is released 30 days from now. thereafter a 14-day “mulling” period to digest public input will take place before the project is officially implemented. This time-frame could potentially mean that e-tolling could be operational in Gauteng before the end of the year.

“Cabinet at its meeting on Wednesday… decided that Sanral should proceed with the implementation of e-tolling,” Martins told reporters in Pretoria.

The initial tariff scheme will see e-tag registered light vehicles paying 30c/km, as opposed to the 40c/km that was proposed last year. The base tariff for light vehicles will, however, remain at 58c/km while fees for e-tagged vehicles will be capped at R550 per month – an amount that Sanral toll and traffic manager Alex van Niekerk claims just 0,2 per cent of Gauteng road users will pay.

In a presentation earlier this week, Van Niekerk claimed that 78,5 per cent of e-tag-subscribed freeway motorists in Gauteng will be paying less than R100 per month, 91,3 percent will pay less than R200 and 96,3 per cent will pay less than R300 a month under the revised system.

Other vehicle categories have also been subject to tariff reductions, including Class B (medium-heavy vehicle) fees dropping 25c/km to 75c/km (originally R1/km) while Class C (heavy vehicles) seeing a reduction from R2/km to R1,50/km.

Source: SAPA