African Railways Research Articles

TRANSNATIONAL TOURISM DEVELOPMENT: AN EARLY EPISODE FROM COLONIAL SOUTHERN AFRICA

Cross-border tourism marketing and promotion is a widely endorsed approach for encouraging regional tourism development. The aim in this paper is to uncover an early historical example of regional tourism development which occurred in colonial Southern Africa. Using archival sources the study pinpoints the contributions of publicity material produced by South African Railways for the promotion of tourism in the territories of colonial Zimbabwe and Mozambique. In encouraging international tourism to South Africa during the 1920s and 1930s there was an understanding that South Africa’s leading national tourism assets were best packaged together for ‘transnational tourism development’ with marketing for the iconic attraction of Victoria Falls as well as Lourenço Marques. The destination which was promoted as ‘South Africa’ in tourism guidebooks did not correspond with the geopolitical entity of the Union of South Africa, instead it embraced the attractions of Portuguese-controlled Mozambique and several tourism products in the British-controlled territory of Rhodesia.

Historical perspective on niche tourism: recreational trout fishing in South Africa

Niche tourism is an important focus in current tourism scholarship. Although the international literature on niche tourism is relatively recent in origin it must be acknowledged that niche tourism is not a new phenomenon and that many types of niche tourism have a long history. The aim in this paper is to address a knowledge gap in current niche tourism literature by examining its under-researched past with a case study of recreational trout fishing in South Africa. Using archival sources this study documents the emergence of trout fishing in South Africa and gives historical insight into its origins as a niche form of rural tourism. The popularisation of recreational trout fishing was given an important boost by the infrastructure and agency of the South African Railways especially its publicity and marketing material. Enhanced automobilities and the emergence of early drive tourism, a by-product of improvements which occurred from the 1930s in South Africa’s road network, further boosted the growth of trout fishing as a niche in rural tourism.

Past Niche Tourism: The First Chapter of Mountain Tourism in South Africa

Mountain tourism enjoys a long history in many countries, much of which is unrecorded. This paper addresses one dimension of the neglected past of recreation and tourism in the Global South. The focus is on the development of mountain tourism as a form of niche tourism in South Africa. The paper contributes to the limited international historical scholarship on niche tourism. In addition, it extends the literature in South African tourism scholarship on tourism’s past, tourism history and the historical geographies of tourism. Using the limited extant literature and with primary archival sources the early development of mountain tourism in South Africa is investigated. The time period covered is from the mid-19th century to the early 1950s. Arguably, the initial origins of mountain tourism in South Africa must be situated at Table Mountain in Cape Town. The focus shifts subsequently to the growth of mountain tourism in the high Drakensberg range. Although mountain tourism is dominated by domestic visitors it is argued that the South African Railways played a vital role in exposing South Africa — and especially the Drakensberg — as a potential destination for international mountain tourists.

The Night Trains: Moving Mozambican Miners to and from South Africa, 1902–1955

The Night Trains: Moving Mozambican Miners to and from South Africa, 1902–1955

Project Management Maturity in the South African Railway Industry

Project Management Maturity in the South African Railway Industry

Leveraging digitilisation and machine learning for improved railway operations and maintenance

The efficient and safe movement of goods and people require reliable railway systems. Quality assurance of manufactured and assembled systems and correct maintenance of such systems are required to keep rolling stock in good operational condition. Quality assurance and maintenance in the railway industry can be costly and time-consuming, but the expansive growth of data due to smart sensors and monitoring technologies makes it possible to leverage the potential of machine learning to reduce cost and labour. Improved reliability and safety, and reduced costs are benefits that the use of “Big Data” and machine learning techniques can realise. However, despite these potential benefits for manufacturers, rail operators, and passengers, the rail industry is still labelled for its lack of innovation, while in most other industries, data is regarded as a strategic asset for competitive advantage.This paper demonstrates how machine learning and data analysis can be used to benefit railway industry manufacturers and operators when applied to rolling stock data. It also illustrates the lost opportunity in the rail industry for not applying data-driven solutions to their full potential. The paper also discusses the current applications of machine learning in the railway industry and provides the requirements for the implementation of machine learning techniques. Machine learning is applied to pantograph data of a South African railway operator's rolling stock. Classification – a machine learning technique – is used to identify and categorise events within the dataset to discover whether pantograph bounce occurs due to faulty sensors, faulty pantographs, or defective infrastructure. In this paper it is demonstrated how machine learning can benefit rail manufacturers and operators to improve manufacturing and assembly processes, as well as maintenance practices. It is concluded that railways should treat data similarly to other railway assets, with suitable management and governance practices.

THE DEVELOPMENT OF AN ACTION PRIORITY MATRIX AND TECHNOLOGY ROADMAP FOR THE IMPLEMENTATION OF DATA-DRIVEN AND MACHINE-LEARNING-BASED PREDICTIVE MAINTENANCE IN THE SOUTH AFRICAN RAILWAY INDUSTRY

In improving railways for the future, artificial intelligence and machine learning were identified as top-priority technology systems that enable data-driven methods and predictive maintenance. A local survey using semi-structured interviews showed that the railway industry lags behind in adopting and implementing data-driven and machine-learning methods for predictive maintenance. Insights from international studies were found to be relevant in South Africa. Other implementation barriers were identified in the socio-economic and socio-political areas of South Africa. An action priority matrix and technology roadmap was developed to guide the South African railway industry towards the implementation of data-driven and machine learning-based predictive maintenance. The action priority matrix was developed by using a two-round Delphi technique to rank the prioritisation of the required activities. The research showed the importance of considering insights from both international studies and the local context when adopting and implementing technology systems to improve business objectives.

Analytic hierarchy process methodology in part selection for fused deposition modelling in the South African railway industry

This study proposes a methodology to identify, evaluate and select parts, components and products within the railway environment that will benefit from the Fused Deposition Modelling Additive Manufacturing technology at the initial conceptual design phase. A review on the state-of-the-art in Multi-Criteria Decision-Making models is presented, focusing on the Fused Deposition Modelling Additive Manufacturing process. The criteria identified in the literature were used to develop a custom evaluation model for part selection specific to railway maintenance applications using the Analytic Hierarchy Process. The proposed methodology is validated using case studies from published literature and then applied to railway-specific case studies to determine its benefit using the Fused Deposition Modelling technology. The railway case studies present functional end-use 3D printed replacement parts, custom tooling and prototype products for railway infrastructure and rolling stock vehicles. Lastly, the proposed methodology was integrated into a program using Visual Basic and Microsoft Excel to assist novice railway engineers in identifying whether parts will benefit from the 3D printing process.

Do we really learn from railway occurrence investigations? A South African railway industry perspective

In South Africa, railway occurrence numbers have remained unchanged over recent years despite stakeholder goals aiming for zero occurrences, suggesting that there is an important need to examine why the numbers have not decreased. This is despite accidents being investigated by the various stakeholders in the rail socio-technical system. A failure to properly identify the underlying causes for incidents may be a possible reason for the number of recurrences. If occurrences are being investigated, why then do the number of occurrences remain largely unchanged? It is proposed that perhaps there are systemic factors within the railway system that influence the investigation process and therefore its effectiveness. Rasmussen’s (1997) Risk Management Framework is used to illustrate the South African railway system and to determine the systemic factors for each level of the system impacting on the effectiveness of occurrence investigations. A qualitative, multi-method approach was adopted. The research highlighted that there are indeed systemic factors that hinder the system’s ability to facilitate a learning culture. Results suggest that there is a distinct lack of mutual trust, transparency, feedback, and sharing of information, and no just culture across the entire system. The results of this research indicate that in the railway system, learning from previous accidents does not always happen. This is largely attributed to a number of systemic factors inherent in the larger railway system that influence the effectiveness of the entire investigation process. It is concluded that failure to identify what really happened during an occurrence and therefore the validity of the recommendations impacts on the system’s ability to learn from such events.

Report on case studies of additive manufacturing in the South African railway industry

Additive manufacturing continues to see increased growth, with adoption in many industrial sectors and increased commercial market value. Market growth is attributed to continued technology and software improvements, growing availability of material types and the ability to produce functional parts with complex geometries. The technology also provides the freedom to optimise the design of both the internal structure and external contours of a component. Additive Manufacturing in South Africa has been driven by the biotechnical/medical, aerospace and automotive industries due to a focus on research and high-value components. To date, there has been limited research involvement from the railway sector. Within the railway environment, the rolling stock and rail infrastructure consists of numerous systems and components which may benefit from the technology in creating replacement spare parts, lightweight structures, improved jigs and fixtures, and new designs of consolidated part-assemblies. This paper presents an industrial view on the use of additive manufacturing and design optimisation techniques for the production of railway related components, together with requirements and challenges. It provides examples that illustrate existing and potential applications of the technology for the design, manufacture and repair of various railway related assets in South Africa.

Evolution and Construction Differentiation Pattern of African Railway Network

Since the new century, countries in Africa have started a new round of rail network planning and construction which brings the completed different features together with the spatial organization of the railway network during the colonial period. Along with the strategic layout of “going out” with China’s railways, the organizational structure of the African railway network will make a tremendous change for the construction market, network organization, and gauge structure of the African railways. Based on the literature reviews, we analyzed and forecasted the evolution of railway network in Africa and discussed the spatial differentiation of the future construction market of the railways from the view of country and enterprise. The results show that the development of the African railway networks will experience three stages: 1850–1960, 1960–2010 and 2010–2050, and that the organization pattern of the African railway network has evolved from the “Hinterland-Port” model to the “Continental Integration” model. The development of railway technical standards tends to be integrated, the gauge type is changed from complicated to single, the gauge distribution is changed from broken to uniform. The contractor countries of the railway changed from English-French dominated to China dominated. The application of railway technical standards is influenced by technology dependence and path dependence and is mainly reflected in the two characteristics of “Chinese standard implantation” and “local standard retention”. The contractor enterprises of railway have a monopoly on the market of a country, CCECC and CRCC are leading, and the contractor enterprises are spatially characterized by four spatial distribution modes: single, continuous, jumping and comprehensive.

Multiple Criteria and Multiple Periods Performance Analysis: A Comparison of North African Railways

Multi-period differences of technical and financial performances are analyzed by comparing five North African railways over the period 1990–2004. A first approach is based on the Malmquist DEA TFP index for measuring the total factors productivity change, decomposed into technical efficiency change and technological changes. A multiple criteria analysis is also performed using the PROMETHEE II method and ARGOS software. These methods provide complementary detailed information, especially by discriminating the technological and management processes by Malmquist and the two dimensions of performance by Promethee, service to the community and enterprise performance, which are often in conflict.

Assessing the performance of Sub-Saharan African (SSA) railways based on an integrated Entropy-MARCOS approach

In this study, the performance of Sub-Saharan African railways systems (SSA) is assessed by using an integrated Entropy-MARCOS (Measurement Alternatives and Ranking according to COmpromise Solution) - based methodology. In the first phase, the Entropy method is employed to determine the weights of each sub-criterion of the decision model. This process identifies six main criteria, i.e., safety, security, internal business aspect, intermodal aspect, innovation, and learning aspect, and customer satisfaction which are further supplemented by 13 sub-criteria. In the second phase, the MARCOS method is used to rank the countries based on their railway performance assessment. Based on the results from the proposed method, a sensitivity analysis was carried out through a comparative analysis with seven other multi-criteria decision-making (MCDM) methods. The results of the study indicate that the most weighted sub-criterion is the labor productivity (internal business perspective criteria) followed by the terrorist incidence (security criteria) and the number of employees going through training/exposure sessions (innovation and learning perspective criteria). Moreover, it was revealed that Kenya is the best alternative in terms of its railway performance followed by Ethiopia, Cameroon, Nigeria, and Ghana. Based on the findings from this study, decision-makers can be assisted during the operative, designing, and planning investigations of the railway system through the consideration of these parameters as insert indicators. Also, the findings can help as a benchmark for the performance analysis of other railway systems in other African countries.

Financing African infrastructure: The role of China in African railways

In recent decades China has become an important source of official finance for African countries, especially for infrastructures. Most railways in Africa, built in the colonial period and then managed by state owned companies, experienced poor performances and deteriorated since independence. From the end of the last century, international financial institutions and traditional donors promoted private concessions in the railway sector, but results were generally below expectations. Based on project level data about official financial flows from the World Bank and from China, the study shows that China is now a main foreign finance provider for the railway systems in Africa. Through panel data regressions on flows at country leveland considering the determinants of funding, we find that financial allocation by China does not seem to be biased in favour of public or private management, nor to favour countries supported by the World Bank before the privatization phase. The needs of recipient countries seem to shape the allocation of funds by China, but also commercial interests play a role in this allocation. Overall funding from China seems to complement World Bank funding in the effort to fill the financing gap of the sector.

Public and Private Management of Sub-Saharan African Railways Companies: A Comparative Analysis of Technical Efficiency

Public and Private Management of Sub-Saharan African Railways Companies: A Comparative Analysis of Technical Efficiency

Past, present and future development of West African railways

In view of the crucial role, railways have played historically inland transportation, the West African region still endure to provide an efficient transport system. While road transport has been almost the exclusive predominant transportation mode in the region, the railway is now showing a global comeback. In the absence of a new phase of modernization at the international standard, it is unavoidable that the high demand for mobility of its increasing population and the full exploitation of its natural resource endowment will be constrained. This study presents the past, present, and future developments of the railway sector. The first section includes the brief historical development of the railways, the determinants choices of their location, and the influential parameters for their construction. The second section deals with the present state of the railway infrastructure, operational performance, and railway sector institutions. The last section provides some recent investment in the key construction projects at a national level.

Folksong and ballad as social comment in some South African railway poems and songs

This article analyses a selection of South African English and Afrikaans humorous and satirical poems and songs about the railways. They include a folksong, “The Kimberley Train”, which dates back to the earliest expansion of the railways to the interior, and poems and songs from the 1960s to the early 90s. While Hugh Masekela raged at the condition of migrant miners, the target of the satire by English- and Afrikaans-speaking writers was the Afrikaner nation, its culture and history. Four of the poems are ballads in the heroic tradition. The characters featured are working-class Afrikaners, and the diction employed is a colloquial South African dialect consisting of modern slang, mixed English and Afrikaans, and Fanakalo. A common method of the humour and satire exploits the connotations of personal and place names.Keywords: Railway poems, railway songs, South African satire, South African poetry, South African folksongs, South African English dialect

Regional derailment: the saga of the East African Railways

ABSTRACTDuring the colonial period of East Africa, railways represented the pre-eminence of colonial influence, commerce and unity within the region. The railways were not just the physical link that connected territories, but also created their own social and economic structures to support them that defined regional authority. Post-colonial East African leaders attempted to capitalize on this existing structure to build on regional bonds. However, the unity that was enforced during the colonial period had become untenable, as national interests within each member state prevented the strengthening of regional ties. This was reflected within one institution: East African Railways. The joys of independence and regional unity soon ran up against the economic and political difficulties between member states of the East African Community (EAC). The latent inequalities between member states could not be overcome and regional interests gave way to nationalistic ones. Within a decade after its founding, the East African Railways had collapsed along with the broader EAC. Decades later, a new EAC has arisen, and with it plans to expand the existing East African Railway network. Will the railways now become a symbol for regional unity or once again become a chess piece in promoting member state's national interests?

The use of laser technology to investigate the effect of railway ballast roundness on shear strength

Abstract The heavy haul coal line of the South African railway network is facing a problem where ballast particles are becoming rounded, negatively affecting performance and thus leading to shorter planned maintenance cycles. This has been attributed to the lack of a more scientific way of evaluating the ballast shape properties. The objective of this paper is to investigate the effect of ballast particle roundness on shear strength properties of five ballast materials used on the Transnet Freight Rail heavy haul coal line. A river pebble sample was included in the study as the reference material for extremely rounded ballast. All six materials were scanned in a 3-D laser scanning system to develop models of the ballast and the river pebble particles. Based on the laser scanner results, a new empirical model has been developed to determine the surface area of ballast materials. The surface area values were further used to develop a chart to assess different particle shapes with varying degrees of roundness. Triaxial tests were conducted to determine the effect of the roundness on the shear strength properties of the materials. A Mohr-Coulomb failure model was successfully developed from the results to represent individual materials tested. The overall results show that the angle of internal friction increases with roundness of the sample greater than 0.8. More rounded particles have values between 0.6 and 0.7, whereas less rounded particles have values between 0.8 and 1.3. The outcomes of this study would assist with quality assessments in the field and whether or not a degraded ballast track layer has to be replaced.

The East African Railway Strike, 1959-60: labour’s challenge of inter-territorialism

The crisis of accumulation which tore East African Railways and Harbours (E.A.R.H.) provoked fierce resistance from African railwaymen in all three colonies. This was marked by the East African Railway Strike which began on 14 November 1959, as the majority of railwaymen stopped work in response to the Railway African Union [Kenya] call for a colony wide strike. Railwaymen in Tanganyika and Uganda followed them into action to mark the region’s first inter-territorial strike. The strike rudely coincided with preparations for African majority government throughout the region, and continued intermittently until April 1960. This had an immense impact and triggered the era of strike waves which challenged the nature of the nationalist transitions to independence throughout the region in which the African bourgeoisie stood to become the principal beneficiaries. The following work attempts to bring out the organic interconnectedness of a regional struggle which veered between unity and fragmentation. In this connection, it questions the role of the British TUC, the International Transport Workers Federation and the International Confederation of Free Trade Unions in deflecting the course, and bargaining down the demands of this momentous confrontation. The examination of the strike attempts to reopen unresolved issues about the role and influence of organised labour within East Africa’s independence struggles.