The taxi rank that gets more traffic than South Africa’s 2 biggest airports

South Africa’s airports may be some of the busiest in the world, but there is a taxi rank that gets more traffic than the country’s largest flight centres.

The Baragwanath Transport Interchange and Traders Market, commonly referred to as the Baragwanath taxi rank, receives more visitors each month than O.R Tambo and Cape Town International Airport combined.

The power of the informal economy

Baragwanath is one of South Africa’s busiest transport depots and has undergone several redevelopments over the years in order to keep up with the growing number of people that pass through every day.

The latest expansion was completed in 2008, allowing the site to accommodate up to 500 street vendors as well as storage facilities, management offices, and support infrastructure, according to Daily Investor.

It functions as the hub for 12 different taxi operators and requires roughly 800 ranking and holding bays to facilitate all the vehicles that stop there.

The sheer scale of Baragwanath’s operation means it is able to take on an average of 13.5 million visitors each month – more than five times what South Africa’s two busiest airports receive.

To put things into perspective, O.R Tambo International in Joburg sees approximately 1.5 million people travel through its domestic, regional, and international terminals every month.

Cape Town International, meanwhile, made headlines earlier this year when Airports Company South Africa announced that the Mother City’s airport had welcomed more than 10 million passengers in a single financial year.

It received a record number of international passengers in March 2024 with 320,000 tickets, and the airport sees an average of 833,333 local and international visitors every 30 days.

All of this goes to show just how busy the Baragwanath taxi rank is, as South Africa’s two biggest airports accommodate less than a fifth of the commuters that the public transport depot does.

Informal economy expert GG Alcock has used Baragwanath as an example of the hidden success behind South Africa’s “second economy” which goes against the narrative that much of its population is suffering from widespread poverty.

The informal economy is worth around R750 billion in South Africa, with a structure that closely resembles the formal economy.

Within the informal sector, industries like auto traders, mechanics, and panel beaters are estimated to employ about 80,000 workers, while the hundreds of small businesses like taverns and spaza shops that set up close to communal hubs like taxi ranks are valued at well over R180 billion.

The informal sector is growing at nearly double the rate of its formal counterpart at 22% per annum, which has led to Johannesburg Stock Exchange (JSE) listed companies looking to invest in the second economy.

While Alcock does acknowledge that many of these smaller businesses are not registered companies and do not pay corporate income tax, they do contribute to VAT.

Additionally, because they are not registered, these businesses are unable to claim VAT refunds, meaning they still make a significant addition to the national fiscus.