Minibus Taxis and Road Safety Introduction and Background Information

The biggest challenge for the Department of Transport is the restructuring of general public transportation. In South Africa, public transportation for the poor is typically depicted through gory pictures of minibus crashes, bodies of loved ones scattered on our roads. South Africa's public transportation however also represents a model of successful black economic self-empowerment. it's the sole sector where blacks control a whole sector through their ownership of the Taxi mode of transportation. The minibus taxi industry is today the foremost critical pillar of our conveyance sector. Not only is it the foremost available mode of transport, but it's also the foremost affordable to the general public. The minibus taxi industry emerged within the wake of the apartheid government’s policy of economic deregulation, initiated in 1987. From the first 1980s onwards, taxi operators began using larger ‘kombi’ minibusses that would carry up to fifteen passengers. Until formal deregulation in 1987, such taxis were illegal. Yet they were popular among black commuters because, unlike other conveyance options, they: 

Taxi Dispatch System

• ran late-night services; 
• traveled to out-of-the-way places; 
• picked up commuters from, and dropped them back at, their homes; 
• charged reasonable fares; 
• made convenient stops on long distances; 
• hamper time spent in long queues at bus and train stations. In the absence of state regulation, groups of operators banded together to make local taxi associations, which intervened to manage loading practices and costs. it had been short, however, before taxi associations began to use their organizational strength to extract income, commonly through the utilization of violence. The legislation was since enacted to supply for the transformation and restructuring of the national land transport system of South Africa and matters incidental thereto.