How much it costs to fix one broken traffic light in South Africa

It costs in the region of R300,000 to repair a vandlised traffic signal in South Africa, the equivalent of buying a Kia Sonet LS in cash.

The enormous figure was revealed by the City of Johannesburg, which is currently facing a scourge of criminal elements targeting its road infrastructure.

The metro is in charge of over 2,000 signalised traffic intersections, around 20% of which’s lights are out of order due to theft, vandalism, and vehicle accidents.

Authorities suspect that a syndicate is behind most of these cases, as criminals are selling traffic and street lights on the black market to turn a quick buck as the infrastructure regularly contains valuable materials such as copper and aluminium.

As a result, the City of Gold has built up a traffic signal repair backlog that stretches over R70 million.

Repairs underway

The Johannesburg Roads Agency (JRA) recently took over the reponsibility of installing and maintaining traffic signals within the city.

The role previously fell under the ambit of the Gauteng Departments of Roads and Transport (GDRT).

Shortly after regaining control, the JRA announced that it would start fixing broken infrastructure with a focus on provincial roads that track through the City of Joburg.

The intersections include:

• Main Road (R55) & Arthur Road
• Main Road (R55) & Sloane Street
• Main Road (R55) & Mopani Road
• Witkoppen Road & Kingfisher Road
• Witkoppen Road & Cedar Road
• Winnie Mandela Drive & Leslie Avenue
• Malibongwe Drive & Kapital Street
• Malibongwe Drive & River Road
• Woodmead Drive & M1 North

In addition to repairing these signals, the JRA is adding safety and security components that aim to reduce instances of theft and vandalism, including strengthened controller boxes with electronic keys and straps, underground chambers housing critical components, secure bollards around the poles, and CCTV cameras with intelligent analytics.

It also developed flood mitigation strategies, which have already borne fruit during this year’s unusually wet rainy season.

“The GDRT and JRA are working on a plan to ensure that other critical intersectoins along the provincial road netwrok are also attended to in due course,” said the JRA.

“These works are seen as critical in the restoration of traffic light services to improve safety and facilitate mobility in and around the city.”

Apart from upgrading these traffic control fixtures, the provincial and municipal governments are actively seeking ways to reduce the attractiveness of infrastructure to criminals.

They are currently engaging with the Council for Scientific and Industrial Research and institutes of higher learning to look into alternative materials that can replace the valuable metals in the lights.

The aluminium and steel traffic signal heads and backboards have already been replaced with nylon-plastic equivalents, and thinner cables with lower copper content have been installed.

Alternative cables such as Copper Cladded Aluminium cables, which have no resale value, were furthermore fitted at high-theft sites, and where applicable, considering geometrical designs and the National Road Traffic Act, hotspot areas were converted from signalised intersections to stop streets.

In addition, the GDRT has formed a relationship with private security firms such as Vumacam which has systems in place to detect suspicious individuals as well as track down wanted perpetrators.

As and when the provincial authority wants, these private companies can put up cameras and other devices that assist law enforcement in dealing with criminals.

Finally, the JRA will henceforth recoup losses from motorists who damaged its infrastructure in vehicle accidents.

It has identified distracted drivers – those who are drunk, texting, or talking with others – as one of the main contributors to its traffic signal woes.

In partnership with the city’s metro police and insurance companies, the JRA will from now on obtain accident reports where traffic signal equipment or any other road infrastructure such as guard rails have been damaged at the accident scene.

They will then mark relevant infrastructure damaged and record the driver’s details, and the JRA’s insurers will subsequently lodge a third-party insurance claim from the complicit driver found at the scene.