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Sanral urged to reveal its secret costs

6 Jun 2014

The City of Cape Town is embroiled in a bitter court battle in an attempt to make the SA National Roads Agency make public the "secret" costs of the proposed introduction of e-tolling on the N1 and N2 highways in Western Cape.

City of Cape Town's transport spokesman, Brett Herron is demanding full disclosure of costs from Sanral. Image: Brett Herron

Sanral says that details of proposed toll fees, the cost of building tolling infrastructure and how the money raised from motorists will be spent should not be made public on the grounds of "commercial confidentiality".

But the city is arguing that the release of this information is in the public interest.

Councillor Brett Herron, responsible for transport, said that Sanral had asked the high court this week to stop the municipality filing court documents that contain facts and figures about the proposed e-tolling.

Western Cape High Court Deputy Judge-President Jeannette Traverso ruled that the agency and the preferred bidder for the project, Protea Parkways Consortium, must apply to the court by 17 June to motivate why the city should be prohibited from filing its court papers openly.

"This tolling project, which the city is opposing with all the resources at its disposal, will be funded by the public," said Herron.

"The city's supplementary papers include facts and figures about how much it will cost to convert the N1 and N2 into toll roads; the proposed toll fees and how these compare to the e-tolls paid by motorists in Gauteng; the toll revenue that the preferred bidder expects; as well as how much of every rand collected in toll fees will be spent on the toll project infrastructure as opposed to other things that will provide road users with benefits, such as road improvements, maintenance and operational work," said Herron

Cape Town obtained an interdict against Sanral in May last year, preventing the agency from tolling the two freeways.

The interdict will be effective until the city's court application for an order to set Sanral's declaration of a toll road aside is finalised.

Source: The Times via I-Net Bridge

Source: I-Net Bridge

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