Client: Gibb Consulting Engineers
Date: October 2019 – November 2019
Scope/Description: The Gautrain Rapid Rail Link, linking OR Tambo International Airport, Johannesburg and Tshwane, is the first and to date only high speed commuter train in Africa. It became operational in 2010, in time for the FIFA Soccer World Cup (OR Tambo to Sandton link) and fully operational for commuters in 2012. The current operations is referred to as phase 1 and for the train to reach its full potential it is critical that the network be fully implemented. Projects of this nature requires massive committment6 from Government in terms of financial resources and as such government must be sure that the funds used to implement the service contributes the most to the economy and the overall benefits over the life cycle of the project outweighs the overall cost of the project.
Responsibilities: My role was technical lead and Subject Matter Expert (SME) responsible for updating the Cost Benefit Analysis (CBA) model. The original CBA model was used to determine which phase (2 – 5) to consider for the extension. The CBA model indicated the phase linking Sandton Station to the west of Johannesburg and finally terminating in Soweto. I had to consider 8 different route alignments, update the construction costs estimates for each route alignment and determine the travel time savings over the life cycle of the project as each route had a different route length with different in train travelling times. The different route alignments were ranked based on their net benefit to the economy.