The Passenger Rail Agency of South Africa (PRASA) has recovered all but five of its railway lines and managed to increase its annual passenger trips tenfold.
This is according to Transport Minister Barbara Creecy, who confirmed that the state-owned entity’s recovery programme is still ongoing, with plans in place to fully restore its network.
The minister was replying to questions posed to her by Freedom Front Plus (FF+) MP Philip van Staden, who asked her about the progress made in restoring commuter rail services to the levels seen before 2019.
Van Staden also sought clarity on the ongoing challenges in the passenger rail sector, which include service reliability and infrastructure constraints.
In her response, Creecy said that PRASA’s recovery programme entailed the repair and restoration of rail infrastructure, including electrical work at substations, stations, signalling and telecommunications, perway and yards, and depots.
“To date, 35 out of 40 lines have been recovered. There is still ongoing rebuilding and recovery work being undertaken to restore the system fully,” she said.
The recovery programme has focused primarily on high-volume lines, with PRASA moving from limited to optimised services on the recovered lines by increasing frequencies on some rail lines.
This will improve running speeds, increase the roll-out of the new trains and reopen the recovered train stations with the intention of operating a full service.
Beyond the recovery and planned further improvements, PRASA has already managed to increase annual passenger trips tenfold since 2019.
“In the 2020/21 financial year, in the immediate aftermath of the COVID pandemic and widespread vandalism and destruction of rail infrastructure, the business recorded 10 million passenger trips”, noted the minister.
“By the end of the 2025/26 financial year, 101 million passenger trips were recorded. The ultimate aim is to reach 600 million passenger trips by 2030/31, in line with pre-pandemic passenger figures.”
Creecy explained that the full recovery of PRASA’s rail lines is expected to be complete by the 2028/29 financial year, though this is subject to funding availability.
General overhaul of PRASA’s operations
Beyond its rail recovery programme, PRASA has also undertaken the General Overhaul (GO) programme, which aims to put more coaches on its network.
As part of this, the agency has already taken delivery of more than 268 refurbished yellow train coaches, which could be deployed on the network at any time.
During an oversight visit to the state-owned entity, the Portfolio Committee on Transport called on the agency to return the coaches to service soon.
The committee’s chairperson, Donald Selamolela, urged the rail agency not to hide its good work.
“The committee is satisfied with the value the entity is adding to our economy and our communities through the General Overhaul (GO) programme,” he said.
“It was a marvel to experience first-hand the work done on the refurbished coaches, the socio-economic impact in the area of Isando and the skills transfer in rail engineering.”
During a walkabout at PRASA’s Braamfontein Depot, committee members received detailed briefings, including about the initial challenges with the General Overhaul programme.
Selamolela noted the challenges, but called on the agency to instead work even harder to ensure that the refurbished trains are returned to service soon.
“The empowerment value of this programme and the general effort that PRASA is putting into getting the rail sector fully functional are noted,” he said.
“We are satisfied with the work on the Mabopane rail corridor, as well as the Gauteng Nerve Centre, which should soon be fully operational.”
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