Question NW813 to the Minister of Transport
24 April 2023 - NW813
Sithole, Mr KP to ask the Minister of Transport
1.Considering that many of the properties belonging to the Passenger Rail Agency of South Africa (Prasa) have become sites of informal communities and temporary shelters for homeless people, what (a) are the details of the sites her department is having the greatest difficulties with, (b) site-specific interventions have been undertaken in each case and (c) has she found to be the impact of the phenomenon on daily operations of Prasa?
Reply:
(a) Land invasion is a common problem not only for private landowners but also government entities such as PRASA, Transnet, etc. There are a number of areas along PRASA network that identified as hotspots of land invasion.
The economic impact of COVID-19, shack farming and political manoeuvring had fuelled unlawful occupation further.
PRASA owns 4 595 Ha of land and most of PRASA’s land is used for operational purposes (stations, depots, railway and rail reserves) and of this it is estimated that 75,8 Ha (2%) are now identified as informally occupied.
Regional breakdown of illegal occupations
12 major hotspots were identified accounting for 86% of all informal occupations (65 Ha). Those are:
WCR
- Philippi 13Ha
- Nyanga 12 Ha
- Mandalay 14 Ha
KZN
- Zwelethu 9 Ha
- Lindokuhle 5.9 Ha
- Umlazi 3.2 Ha
- Duffs Road 2 Ha
Gauteng
- Halte 2 (Kopanong, Klipkruisfontein,Lebaleng) 6.7 Ha
- Rosslyn 3.5 Ha
- New Canada 2.2 Ha
- Alberton 1.7 Ha
- De Wildt 1.6 Ha
Encroachments - There are several cases where land is occupied by encroachment of formal or semi-formal residential areas into PRASA’s rail reserve. Such occupations are small in terms of areas but may have big impact on operations and extremely difficult to deal with due to the large number of households involved.
Vagrants - PRASA is experiencing an influx of vagrants in vacant buildings or in stations after hours, especially those not manned. They tend to sleep in the area and use the ablution facilities, as well as creating temporary accommodation in vacant buildings and start open fires to keep warm that can lead to burning of the premises. Problems is also experienced with Nayope users that steal and vandalise the buildings for items to sell.
(b) & (c)
The impact on PRASA, especially around Phillipi, has dire consequences as it impacted on the recovery of the Central Line. The recovery of the Central Line has been declared as a Presidential Programme and the Minister of Transport and the Minister of Human Settlements have been driving this project with the support of the Department of Public Works, Provincial Government and the City of Cape Town.
The relocation and prevention of illegal land invasions cannot be addressed in isolation and various spheres of government have to be involved.
PRASA has also set up an internal task team to set guidelines and processes to prevent illegal land invasions, encroachments and vagrants and have a standard approach on the relocation and removal of such.
In the main the task team will be focus on the following key areas:
