Fin24 reports that having spent its entire capital budget allocation, the Passenger Rail Agency of SA (Prasa) has nonetheless set a target of having close to 80% of its original 40 operational corridors functioning by March 2024.

The railway utility is currently operating limited train services on 18 lines. At the end of March 2022, it was running just five train services that transported about 15 million passengers. It is aiming to add another five million by next year, taking the total to 20 million. At its height in the year ended March 2015, Prasa transported more than 500 million passengers. There are currently eight operating lines in the Western Cape, six in Gauteng and four in KwaZulu-Natal. Prasa is focusing on rebuilding and modernising 33 train stations this year and fencing off some of its depots and maintenance yards in these areas. "We are targeting to be operating 32 corridors by the end of this financial year," Prasa group CEO Hishaam Emeran told the transport portfolio committee of parliament on Tuesday. This will bring the total to 80% of the train services the utility operated before the national lockdown began in March 2020 during which railway infrastructure, including electrical cabling and railway tracks, was looted and carted away, while station infrastructure was also stolen and carried off. In the financial year ended March 2023 the utility achieved 59% of the operational targets that had been set by its board, compared to only 18% of the targets achieved during the previous year.

• Read the full original of the report in the above regard by Sikonathi Mantshantsha at Fin24
• Read too, ‘We need R6 billion from taxpayers’, Prasa tells parliament, at Mail & Guardian (subscriber access only)

Get other news reports at the SA Labour News home page