Secondary roads in Gauteng will bear the brunt of motorists trying to avoid paying toll fees on the highways, members of the South African Institution of Civil Engineering (SAICE) said on Tuesday.

SAICE questioned three of its transport division members Dr John Sampson, André Frieslaar and Roger Crook about the merits of the Gauteng Freeway Improvement Project (GFIP) in an effort to gain a better understanding of the various issues affecting the implementation of e-tolling.

Sampson said that he was unsure if secondary roads would be able to cope with the influx of additional motorists trying to avoid the tolling system. The highway upgrade programme under the GFIP has increased overall road capacity and has drawn traffic off the secondary roads.

“Tolling will put a lot of traffic back onto these roads, but less than was taken off by the capacity upgrade,” he said.

Commenting on whether income from e-tolling could also be applied for the maintenance and upgrading of these secondary roads, Sampson pointed out that the South African National Roads Agency Limited (Sanral) Act did not allow for ring-fenced toll monies to be spent for projects other than national roads. He also noted that there would not be any “spare” income from the toll for at least the next 10 to 15 years.

Both Frieslaar and Crook said a once-off payment to routes that receive a high proportion of diverted traffic from the tolled road could be a possibility, but cautioned that a toll road should not be responsible for paying for a wide road network, which then has the effect of increasing the tolls.

Further, Sampson believed that the GFIP toll could have been incorporated into the existing fuel levy, or through other taxes currently in place.

“This could have been achieved easily, efficiently, cheaply and instantly. However, one must bear in mind that the Sanral Act required them to toll roads where possible. Sanral therefore are complying with an Act of Parliament and had Cabinet approval to proceed with the GFIP. They were not given the choice of increasing the fuel levy,” Sampson said.

Frieslaar and Crook agreed, but believed that most equitable would be a form of subsidised toll. “That will introduce the opportunity in the future to introduce some form of road pricing for peak periods or heavily congested routes.”

Meanwhile, when asked about whether Electronic Toll Collection – the company jointly owned by Kapsch and TMT awarded the contract to manage the toll system – would be able to enforce compliance among motorists, Sampson said there would be traffic control stations where about 280 dedicated police officers would pull off users who do not pay the toll.

It was likely that non-Gauteng drivers can go through once and get away without paying, but if they came through again the electronics would alert the police, Sampson stated.

The experts agreed that the recovery of monies through Administrative Adjudication of Road Traffic Offences was a weak link in the tolling process, not only for those outside Gauteng, but also for residents without a transponder.

Commenting on Sanral’s public awareness campaign, Sampson said the agency had done as much as it needed to comply with public engagement laws.

“It could be argued that they should have given more publicity and had more consultation before they had it approved by Cabinet, but people rarely react strongly to broad, unclear (to them) plans (they did not react when it was proposed). They react when it hits their pocket,” he said.

Light vehicles fitted with e-tags will pay 30c/km, down from the 40c/km initially announced. Motorcycles will pay 20c/km, nonarticulated trucks 75c/km and articulated trucks R1.51/km.

A frequent user cap of R550 a month has been set on light vehicles and motorcycles, while a time of day saving of 20% for heavy vehicles will be introduced.

Tolling on the upgraded Gauteng highways will start on April 30.