The development of a metric for the accessibility and affordability of transport in South Africa

Abstract

Accessibility and a ordability of transport have a major impact on the people living in a country. Accessibility is de ned as the ease with which people are able to reach activities or destinations (Litman, 2010a), whilst transport a ordability is de ned as the ability to purchase access (Litman, 2010b). In South Africa, the way in which accessibility and a ordability of transport are currently measured is insu cient, as people's needs are not taken into consideration. In this project, the objective is to develop metric, a standard of measurement, which quanti es the performance of these aspects within the transport system. The Nelson Mandela Bay Metropolitan is used as the study area since it is relatively isolated, providing a relevant representation of reality. The various factors that a ect accessibility and a ordability are researched in order to understand what impact these factors have on the transport system. Previous measures that have been used to assess accessibility and a ordability in other countries, are taken into account when designing the metric. Data is gathered from a variety of sources, predominantly surveys carried out by Statistics South Africa. Using a synthetic population and a multi-agent transport simulation toolkit (MATSim), the transport system is simulated and used to test the feasibility of the metric. The development of a metric is a bene t to the government as it assists in the planning and assessing of the transport system in South Africa, as well as enabling the testing of strategies that will assist in uplifting the poor.