The NWU is driving expertise into South Africa’s transport future
As we celebrate Transport Month in October, we are reminded that transport is the backbone of South Africa’s economy and transport mobility.
But the system is under strain. In 2023, rail payloads rose by only 2.7 % to 160.3 million tonnes while road freight accounted for 862.5 million tonnes, reflecting how heavily we still rely on roads. Road freight currently carries over 83 % of all freight payloads. Meanwhile, public transport is stretched. In 2020, workers using trains spent 107 minutes commuting in the morning; bus users averaged 84 minutes; taxi users spent 63 minutes.
These figures expose several dilemmas. First, the imbalance between road and rail burdens the roads, increases maintenance costs, and worsens carbon emissions. Second, long commute times and inefficiencies deepen inequality by taxing poorer commuters disproportionally. Third, underinvestment and infrastructure decay have reduced rail utilisation dramatically. Reports suggest train service utilisation dropped by as much as 97 % between 2008 and 2022.
At the North-West University (NWU), we’re responding by developing multi-disciplinary experts across transport engineering, logistics, environmental planning, data analytics, public policy and social sciences to address these problems.
Transport Month serves to underline that South Africa doesn’t lack ideas, it lacks integrated, ethical solutions. The NWU is committed to delivering precisely those: graduates who can engage with the technical, social and ethical dimensions of transport to help build a safer, fairer, greener system for all.