Client: City of Tshwane
Date: June 2009 – June 2012, August 2016 – May 2017, October 2017 – August 2018
Scope/Description: In 2007, Parliament approved the Department of Transport’s Public Transport Strategy and Action Plan, which proposed a phased implementation of the Integrated Rapid Public Transport Networks with the initial aim to have IRPTN’s operational in 12 Cities and 6 Rural Districts by 2014. This Action Plan was based on 2 thrusts, namely accelerated modal upgrading and development of Integrated Rapid Public Transport Networks. This Action Plan shifted thew focus of cities as the majority of funds earmarked for public transport was channelled to IRPTN development and implementation.
June 2009 – June 2012
Responsibilities: I was seconded to City of Tshwane (CoT) for a period of 3 years after being appointed as Business Workstream Leader for the first Project Management Unit (PMU) for the BRT project. Integration and co-ordination between the different workstreams was crucial in the early stages of the project and assisted in getting a full understanding of the complexities of the project. I was responsible for drafting the Terms of Reference for refining the transportation model and developing a financial model for the project. I was part of the technical team that adjudicated the tenders and recommended the preferred bidder to the CoT. Once appointed, I was responsible for the overall project management of the consortium, measuring outputs against agreed milestones and payment. The financial model required substantial technical input from myself as a BRT operations specialist in terms of overall costing and staffing levels for the model to be legitimate.
August 2016 – May 2017
Responsibilities: I was contracted as lead technical advisor in the Business Workstream of the PMU to review the Full Clearance Permanent Compensation (FCPC) Strategy, which was approved by CoT. This minibus taxi industry felt they had not been sufficiently consulted and the bus industry felt that they were ignored during the development of the FCPC. My role was to workshop the FCPC again with the two stakeholder groups, and to update the compensation model used to determine the compensation to be paid to the affected operators for Line 1a. The compensation model was updated to allow for compensation to be paid for a section of the full route only – the last 7 km of a 35 km route where the BRT trunk line will operat6e from. I was the lead negotiator for the CoT in negotiating the compensation with the minibus taxi industry technical advisors and chairman of the affected associations. Once negotiations was concluded and agreed, the process followed had to be communicated to the Department of Transport for final approval. That was received and the pay-out commenced in November 2016.
October 2017 – August 2018
Responsibilities: I was appointed as part of an Interim PMU, which was established to fill the void created between the ending of the previous PMU contract term and the appointment of a new PMU. During this period my role shifted to operations and commercial contract risks inherent to the business model adopted for managing the BRT system. Contracts flagged as high risk included the Bus Operating Company Agreement (BOCA), the Automated Fare Collection (AFC) contract, the Station Management Contact and the Call Centre through the PTMS that was deployed on the routes and in the buses at the time. To mitigate against the overall risks, the concept of Technical Notes was established to make the City and other PMU work streams aware of the commercial and financial risk of infrastructure limitations and ownership, the ongoing commercial risk with continuing with Tshwane Bus Service (TBS) in its current format and operations. Payment problems to the bus operating company was flagged and it was recommended that a zero based budget be implemented for the bus operating company whereby future payment will be done on actual expenses (invoices) as opposed to an approved budget. In terms of compliance with the Municipal Finance Management Act and The development of a Provincial Land Transport Framework is a statutory requirement in terms of the National Land Transport Act and Council Resolutions, the ongoing payment of Interim Compensation to the affected minibus taxi associations since 2014 was flagged as irregular expenditure as it started in 2014 and was past its 3 year term.