Global engineering and technical services company Aurecon technical director and intelligent transport systems (ITSes ) service line leader Mike van Tonder has been elected president of the Intelligent Transport Society of South Africa (ITSSA).

Van Tonder will oversee the organisation’s vision to achieve a balanced and integrated transport system in sustainable cities with public transport as a mode of choice.

The ITSSA aims to keep its members up to date with the latest technological advances in intelligent transport systems and is driven by its contribution to an enabling environment; growing its membership base and network, or partners and collaborators; strengthening its strategic positioning and brand equity in the local and global markets; and delivering value-added services.

The executive committee, of which Van Tonder is now a member, is responsible for driving the strategic direction of the organisation with the board of directors and is a one-year, part-time position.

“ITS is not only about the application of smart transport technology – it also needs to be embedded in government policies and departmental strategies at all levels. I hope to assist in creating a broader awareness of the ITS, especially in its applicability in a developing South Africa and at smaller municipalities in South Africa,” he tells Engineering News.

He adds that he also aims to assist in establishing the ITSSA as a prominent continental organisation of African-member ITS associations.

As president of the ITSSA, Van Tonder will use the strategic focus gained in this role and help develop Aurecon’s ITS strategy in Africa and other developing countries.

Similarly, having been exposed to Australasian, Asian and Middle Eastern projects through Aurecon, he hopes to bring an international perspective to the executive committee and the ITSSA board.

The ITS will improve the functionality of transport operations, make them more user friendly, reduce their carbon footprint, and reduce fatalities and injuries.

To achieve this, innovations need to drive the ITSSA, which Van Tonder hopes to implement.

“There are many cities worldwide and in South Africa that are going ‘smart’ to improve the lives of citizens, and transport, especially public transport, which is often the leading smart technology that is implemented first in any smart city roll- out programme. “The ITSSA is the enabler of this smart transportation technology and, therefore, plays a vital role in social upliftment and economic empowerment in South Africa,” he states.

However, compared with ITS America and many other ITS country organisations, the ITSSA is not government-funded, but is funded by its members to pay for its projects, which is a challenge.

“A second major challenge then is how to fund ITSSA projects? We need to think differently and use the members’ available resources and cooperative agreements to fund these projects,” he says.

The executive committee has identified the challenges facing the organisation and is developing a high-level strategy to present to the board for debate and discussion before taking it to the organisation’s members, Van Tonder concludes.