The proposal is that municipalities should integrate the ticketing systems for public transport systems so that a commuter could catch a taxi from home to a bus station, then take a bus to a railway station and catch a train to work, but use the same ticket for all three.

Mahlalela said this was currently split across national, provincial and local levels.

“We therefore need to consolidate all these functions and locate it in the municipality,” he said.

While the idea is to extend this eventually around the country, the municipalities must have the capacity.

“It might take a year, it might take five years, it might take 10 years.”

The devolution of function would include the moving of some of Prasa’s operational budget to the municipality to pay for the system, but all infrastructure – and thus capital budgets – would remain with Prasa.

The municipalities might make a little money from this, but would be expected to put this back into the system.

“The integrated ticketing system is the most important element of the evolution of public transport in South Africa,” said Mahlalela.

He said Cape Town was the logical city to start as its commuter system revolved around rail.

While the national planning focuses on municipal centralisation of transport planning, in Gauteng it’s more likely to be a provincial focus.

Gauteng Transport MEC Ismail Vadi said it wouldn’t make sense to devolve commuter public transport systems to municipalities as the province has three metros with common borders – creating a city region – so systems needed to link up properly.

“In this kind of a situation, to talk about devolving all public transport functions – bus, rail, etc – to municipalities is not a logical and practical way forward.

“You have to look at significant provincial integration, co-ordination and planning,” said Vadi.

Gauteng is thus looking at setting up a Gauteng Transport Authority to do such co-ordinating.

“It will be more sensible and practical to locate that function at provincial level,” said Vadi.

“At the moment, without really an overall strategic plan, each of the metropolitan municipalities are rolling out their own bus rapid transit systems.”

Gauteng has already taken on this function with the Gautrain link between the metros of Tshwane and Joburg.

Last year, Gauteng set up a committee to develop five- and 25-year transport plans for the province, which Vadi said were urgently needed.

“At the moment, Gauteng hasn’t got any kind of significant plan on the table.”