The freeways upgraded under the Gauteng Freeway Improvement Project (GFIP) will be the first in South Africa to use an open road tolling system, with electronic toll collection, which will come into operation after completion of the project, in October 2010.

“Open road tolling means that there is not going to be any kind of physical impediment along the way, so people will not have to stop on the road to pay for the use of the road, before they continue their journey,” South African National Roads Agency Limited (Sanral) CEO Nazir Alli tells Engineering News.

Some 38 overhead gantries will be placed about 10 km apart along the newly upgraded 
roads. The gantries will be fitted with 
detection devices, such as cameras and aerial transreceivers, which will either recognise the number plate of a vehicle, or the electronic tag bought by a motorist and displayed on the windscreen of the vehicle.

The equipment on the gantry will record the vehicle, the toll account of which could be linked to the motorists’ bank account.


Sanral envisages that motorists will register for and obtain electronic toll tags, which are linked to bank accounts. 
‘Top-ups’ of a motorist’s toll account could be done over the Internet, through customer service centres, through a cellular phone, or at petrol stations and retail stores.

“When your vehicle goes underneath the gantry, your vehicle will be recorded, and then the toll will be calculated – it will be calculated on a daily basis, and there will be various ways for people to set up accounts,” explains Sanral toll and traffic manager Alex van Niekerk.

The tolls would be used to repay investors who have participated in the funding of the GFIP. Sanral is raising funds for the projects, as required, through the issuance of bonds on the Bond Exchange of South Africa.
The agency raised R4,6-billion for the project in 2008, and has plans raise a further R2,5-billion by April.

“We need to repay these loans, and also have a sustainable revenue stream to do 
further roll-outs and improvements, and 
upgrade schemes of the whole network. So this is the system to collect the money to repay,” adds Van Niekerk.

Alli explains that Sanral decides on the toll prices, which are linked to the consumer 
price index, and regulated by the Minister of Transport.

Once electronic toll collection has been 
implemented in Gauteng, it would likely be rolled out countrywide.

This would be a welcome way to alleviate congestion experienced at manual tollgates.

Sanral says that toll accounts would need to be paid within seven days, and violations would be met with stiff fines. Applicable legislation is under discussion, and the payment system will also be linked to eNaTIS.

Alli states that Sanral will take a tough stance on payment violations, and forecasts that the biggest challenge will come in the form of vehicles travelling on highways without number plates. 


He adds that cars without number plates will be spotted on cameras, and operators at the operation centre will 
inform law enforcement officers on the roads, who would then pull vehicles over. 
Dedicated areas for vehicles to stop when pulled over are also being built along the roadsides.

The GFIP, Sanral’s flagship project, is currently upgrading about 150 km of road in the Gauteng freeway system, as well as a number of interchanges. 
The freeways will be upgraded to four lanes in each direction and, in some sections, up to six lanes in each direction.

Some 27 interchanges and on- and off-ramps will be upgraded, and these include the Lynnwood interchange, the William Nicol 
interchange, the Allandale interchange and the Malibongwe interchange.

Crossroad improvements also form part of the project, and median lighting will be provided. Roads upgraded under the GFIP will also make use of intelligent transport systems (ITS).

Sanral has already been making use of ITS on about 220 km of the road network under its control. 
The N1 Ben Schoeman highway, which is the busiest highway in the southern hemisphere – carrying between 120 000 and 180 000 vehicles 
a day – makes use of these systems. The systems allow Sanral to monitor and manage traffic flow on the networks from a single 
operations management centre.

The ITS includes closed-circuit television cameras, variable electronic message sign boards, ramp metering and traffic detection, and the systems are linked by fibre 
optics. 
Sanral says the systems have allowed for improved incident management, and communication means greater speed and efficiency 
in handling accidents.

The main aim of the improvement project is to alleviate congestion on the roads, and bolster economic growth in the province. 
“The technology and the construction work that is taking place, the amount of jobs we are creating, and the development of the SMME sector in the construction industry are exciting,” concludes Alli.

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