As of Thursday, 1 December 2022, the City of Cape Town is suspending its MyCiTi Airport Service bus route due to diesel prices in South Africa rising by over 50% in 2022.
“The City’s Urban Mobility Directorate is continuously monitoring the MyCiTi routes to ensure the long-term financial sustainability of the service and efficient operations by allocating resources in accordance with passenger demand,” said the City’s mayoral committee member for urban mobility, councillor Rob Quintas.
“The 50.5% increase in the diesel price from 5 January to 2 November 2022, coupled with the low number of passengers making use of the Airport Service, have necessitated an intervention.”
After the MyCiTi Airport Service suspends operations this coming Thursday, buses that operate on the path will be redeployed to other popular routes which connect Atlantis with Table View, Century City, and the Cape Town CBD.
“The provision of additional buses to high-demand areas will improve the day-to-day lives of regular commuters who have a great need for the MyCiTi service,” said Quintas.
“That said, we will investigate more cost-effective and innovative solutions to resume the service in the future.”
Information on the timetables, routes, and rates of the MyCiTi service is available online and on the MyCiTi app for iOS and Android.
Diesel prices could be coming down
Diesel prices in South Africa are currently at highs of 25.75 per litre but preliminary reports from the Central Energy Fund point to a possible retreat next month.
As of 23 November, the country’s daily fuel-price data showed that in December, a decrease of between R1.05 to R1.12 per litre could be on the cards for this fuel type.
This is due to the local currency gaining strength against the US dollar over the course of the last month as well as international oil prices remaining relatively flat over the same period.
If these decreases do come to fruition, inland motorists face prices of R24.37 for Diesel 500ppm and R24.70 for Diesel 50ppm.
Even with these welcome drops, if they do happen, South Africans will still be paying a massive amount of between R7.09 to R7.45 more for a litre of diesel in December 2022 than they had to in January.
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