The Intersection of Spatial Fragmentation and Smart Transport Planning in Gauteng Province, South Africa: Constraints and Opportunities

Abstract

Since the dawn of the new democracy in South Africa, practitioners, policy makers and stakeholders have been resolute on the need to confront spatial fragmentation in order to overcome the spatial inefficiencies that the spatial geography has imprinted on the transportation landscape in the country. Gauteng province is home to the full cycle of impacts and outcomes of apartheid driven spatial and transport inefficiencies. Urban spatial and transportation critics have suggested that adopting a smart transport planning system in the province is one way of seeking to reverse and correct the spatial and transport inefficiencies in Gauteng province. Making use of discourse analysis and systems innovation theory, smart transport and spatial fragmentation integration levers in Gauteng province are unraveled. Transport household databases of the 2003 and 2013 national surveys by the Department of Transport in South Africa as well as Statistics South Africa 2001, 2009, 2011, 2015, and 2018 census and community household surveys complement and provide an interpretative framework for situating spatial fragmentation and smart transport intersections including efficiencies and or inefficiencies in South Africa. To address spatial fragmentation, it is proposed that advanced spatial planning incorporating smart technologies be applied.