R861m Gautrain bill

Pitbull said:
The gautrain is working.
Click to expand...

Agreed but 22% of the entire transport budget to cater for 60 000 ppl a day is ludicrous... The money spent on the Gautrain should much rather have been spent on the metrorail system, but I'm guessing more tenderpreneurs benefited from a brand new system.

And this is coming from someone who wouldn't have a relationship without the Gautrain(she lives in PTA with no license and me in JBG)
 
Pitbull said:
Even if it doesn't. 60 odd thousand people benefit from it daily. It's still a good thing.
Click to expand...

I'm pretty sure most of the people commenting here that the Gautrain is a failure haven't considered the cost/benefit ratio of a project like Gautrain. Although it might not be making a profit itself, the total BENEFIT it provides to society still probably outweighs the cost of the operation which is the important part.
 
Pitbull said:
Even if it doesn't. 60 odd thousand people benefit from it daily. It's still a good thing.
Click to expand...

60,000 people in Gauteng out of 12 Million is half of 0.01 percent. That is an EXTREMELY small segment of the market to be served.

Even if you only count the work force... it's still only 0.01%
 
Garyvdh said:
60,000 people in Gauteng out of 12 Million is half of 0.01 percent. That is an EXTREMELY small segment of the market to be served.

Even if you only count the work force... it's still only 0.01%
Click to expand...

(60000/12000000) * 100 = 0.5% if you're going to do maths, at least get it right.\

0.5% is 50 times bigger than your 0.01% you seem to have pulled out of thin air.
 
hawker said:
(60000/12000000) * 100 = 0.5% if you're going to do maths, at least get it right.\

0.5% is 50 times bigger than your 0.01% you seem to have pulled out of thin air.
Click to expand...

err it's 0.005% genius

60 000 / 12 000 000

And yes I'm right, don't argue with a zimbo about messing up zeros in thousands, millions and billions.
 
Pitbull said:
The gautrain is a great idea and it's working. Unlike the e-tolls nonsense.

It's an expense that will in time be paid off and the fees will be going to maintenance. It's not suppose to be making a profit. It's a project government should be funding anyway. How do you guys think the old railways were built? It's a massive expense which becomes viable over time.
Click to expand...

But at near 23% of the department's budget, it is way too expensive. They need to do something to ensure that it covers much more of its operational cost.
 
Garyvdh said:
60,000 people in Gauteng out of 12 Million is half of 0.01 percent. That is an EXTREMELY small segment of the market to be served.

Even if you only count the work force... it's still only 0.01%
Click to expand...

Yes, and by no means will I ever dispute that. But it was never built to service 12 million people. The route caters for the biggest problem we have in Gauteng. It's just insane to thing someone on the Westrand was suppose to benefit from it. It was never build with them in mind.
 
R13... said:
But at near 23% of the department's budget, it is way too expensive. They need to do something to ensure that it covers much more of its operational cost.
Click to expand...

I can't dispute that. It's a massive chunk or money. But the reason it's 23% of the budget is because of the size of the budget. More needs to be spent on infrastructure I agree 100% and other areas also needs to be catered for. But the budget size has nothing to do with the Gautrain project at all. That is a government issue.
 
hawker said:
(60000/12000000) * 100 = 0.5% if you're going to do maths, at least get it right.\

0.5% is 50 times bigger than your 0.01% you seem to have pulled out of thin air.
Click to expand...

Whether it is 0.005% or 0.5% ... it's still less than 1% of the population that is benefitting from this thing.... yet it is sucking up so much money?
How on earth you view that as a success is beyond me.
 
hawker said:
I'm pretty sure most of the people commenting here that the Gautrain is a failure haven't considered the cost/benefit ratio of a project like Gautrain. Although it might not be making a profit itself, the total BENEFIT it provides to society still probably outweighs the cost of the operation which is the important part.
Click to expand...

So a RBillion extra costs a year to serve 60000 people is viable? Why not take the money devide it up and give it to those people then they would not need any transport at all.
 
Garyvdh said:
Whether it is 0.005% or 0.5% ... it's still less than 1% of the population that is benefitting from this thing.... yet it is sucking up so much money?
How on earth you view that as a success is beyond me.
Click to expand...

One could argue ( I'm not making the argument, just seeing a case for it ) that the excess tourism and international interest that we get from overseas businessmen that can land at JHB and commute to Sandton within half an hour offsets some of that cost. I'm not an economist, so I can't comment on how much benefit the country sees from that sort of thing.
 
I'd be nice to see the Rea Vaya figures while they're at it. Or any of the other city bus systems.
 
Seriously said:
So a RBillion extra costs a year to serve 60000 people is viable? Why not take the money devide it up and give it to those people then they would not need any transport at all.
Click to expand...

Remember the initial setup of the service is the bulk of the money.

Once the debt has been settled on the money used to built the Gautrain. It will be service which cost the tax payer ZERO. To use the same example as with the old railway systems. When they were built it had a huge cost implication and the government carried that burden. When it was paid off, the rail road was the most cost effective way of transport for good and people. It actually still is. Same with the Gautrain. Once the setup cost has been dissolved there will be no over heads as the over heads will be paid by the users.
 
Pitbull said:
Remember the initial setup of the service is the bulk of the money.

Once the debt has been settled on the money used to built the Gautrain. It will be service which cost the tax payer ZERO. To use the same example as with the old railway systems. When they were built it had a huge cost implication and the government carried that burden. When it was paid off, the rail road was the most cost effective way of transport for good and people. It actually still is. Same with the Gautrain. Once the setup cost has been dissolved there will be no over heads as the over heads will be paid by the users.
Click to expand...

Will never happen in Africa. The cost to the commuter + a yearly raise will remain forever and total income will be for the back pockets and further "development". This is eSouthAfrica where the criminal ANC and comrades are ruling.
 
bullzeye.za said:
One could argue ( I'm not making the argument, just seeing a case for it ) that the excess tourism and international interest that we get from overseas businessmen that can land at JHB and commute to Sandton within half an hour offsets some of that cost. I'm not an economist, so I can't comment on how much benefit the country sees from that sort of thing.
Click to expand...

Not all do business in Sandton and there are taxis with an improved highway system making it less than of an requirement. ;) It's a convenience benefitting a very very small group of people at an HUGE very HUGE cost..
 
ANC Project, enrich a few cadres and tax people that has no real benefit for it.
 
Pitbull said:
Remember the initial setup of the service is the bulk of the money.

Once the debt has been settled on the money used to built the Gautrain. It will be service which cost the tax payer ZERO. To use the same example as with the old railway systems. When they were built it had a huge cost implication and the government carried that burden. When it was paid off, the rail road was the most cost effective way of transport for good and people. It actually still is. Same with the Gautrain. Once the setup cost has been dissolved there will be no over heads as the over heads will be paid by the users.
Click to expand...

Then the taxpayer's bill should be decreasing every year. Unfortunately that is not the current trend.

I find it funny that the user pay principle is not applied here. Ticket prices should be increased for users.
 
ScottulusMaximus said:
err it's 0.005% genius

60 000 / 12 000 000

And yes I'm right, don't argue with a zimbo about messing up zeros in thousands, millions and billions.
Click to expand...

No, it is 0.5% 60000 goes into 12000000 200 times, so it is half of one percent of 12000000.
 
if you are going to argue with maths make sure you understand the numbers:
[1] there is an average week daily ridership of 60k
[2] this does not equate to the number of people who use the Gautrain nor does it reflect the number of people benefiting from it
[3] in that number is a number of people who use the Gautrain most working days of the year as well as people who use it less frequently although down to a single time commuter

So rather argue about the number of unique riders and the number of individuals for whom the Gautrain offers an opportunity choice - so the people working near a station who don't use the Gautrain but would the day their car doesn't start and then have somebody pick them up from a closer station.

The unique ridership numbers are well in excess of the million mark so more than 2% of the population of South Africa ...
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top
Sign up to the MyBroadband newsletter
X