Fancy a nostalgic train safari to Mpumalanga or Victoria Falls? Better not get your hopes up, warn private train tour operators. They complain that a shortage of locomotives, coupled with poor planning, has made business conditions increasingly difficult. While major players are known to be affected, smaller operators have had to close down.
Private train tour operators own or hire coaches from Transnet Freight Rail, previously known as Spoornet. Most operators also hire their locomotives from Transnet, which sees freight, rather than passenger rail, as its core business, and gives priority to freight needs. Rail tourism is further disadvantaged, they say, by Transnet mismanagement and inefficiency.
According to tour operator Johannes “Boon” Boonzaaier, repeated train cancellations at short notice made it virtually impossible to run his business, Bushveld Train Safaris. In April last year, a train to Botswana was kept waiting for six hours in Krugersdorp because a locomotive was not available. The following month, a train from Port Elizabeth to Namibia was nearly cancelled, at four days’ notice, because the train was not approved. “Eventually one of the managers at Spoornet gave permission. My nerves [were] almost gone, because that kind of thing can really kill your business,” Boonzaaier said. “The service wasn’t right. It cost us a lot of money just because of the locomotives.”
He acknowledged that “in some instances” there is a shortage of drivers and locomotives, but maintained that better plannning could have resolved the issue. He said freight trains ran empty when goods were not available, and that some train drivers did not have enough work. Operators submitted proposed tour schedules a year ahead to Spoornet, which then gave permission for various routes, but despite this advance notice, trains were cancelled with two weeks’ notice or less.
The tourism industry provided an additional income stream to Transnet. Bushveld Train Safaris, for example, paid “more than R8-million” in 2005 to the rail operator, but last year, because of cancelled trips, this dropped to R6,5-million. The company was also a boon to far-flung towns and villages on branch lines, where operators bought meals and supplies. “We not only generated income to Spoornet, but also created jobs all over the country,” Boonzaaier said.
At a meeting in June last year, Spoornet, as it was then known, told private operators the locomotive shortage meant that tours would be cancelled. Smaller players such as Bushveld Train Safaris had to give their leased coaches back to the group and are now using regular train services and luxury buses. Rovos Rail and the Shongololo Express, which own coaches, were able to continue.
Shosholoza Meyl, the long-distance train service, now operates four “tourist trains”, between Johannesburg, Port Elizabeth, Durban and Cape Town. But private operators such as Boonzaaier say that the most scenic rail journeys are to be found on branch lines, rather than main lines. It is these train tours that appear most endangered.
Rohan Vos, the owner of luxury rail company Rovos Rail, said he hoped Spoornet would allow steam engines to be used, although they are costly to maintain, as this could ease the locomotive shortage. Currently, steam is not allowed on main lines.
But according to industry sources, Transnet Freight Rail has faced a high management turnover and inefficiency is rife. One operator said there had been serious problems with the service, but that it appeared to be due to “idiocy and inefficiency” on the company’s part, rather than policy.
Transnet’s locomotive shortage was widely acknowledged, said Transnet Freight Rail spokesperson Molatwane Likhethe. He denied that any scheduled trains, for which operators could show a signed agreement, had been cancelled. He blamed operators who had allowed travellers to book trips despite ongoing uncertainty, and suggested that permission had not always been sought for trains.
Likhethe added that Shosholoza Meyl provided services to a different market, and was not attempting to compete with the private operators, as an industry source alleged.
But the plight of the private operators, and the continued pressure on rail resources, raises questions about the future viability of the Blue Train, which Transnet is hoping to sell off. “You’ve got to think twice [about buying it]. You’ll spend a lot of money and you might not even have your own locomotive,” said the source.