Passenger Railway Agency South Africa (Prasa) said it will completely close Pretoria Station with no trains accessing the station for a period of 40 days with effect from 14 December 2018 till 22 January 2019.
Prasa said their modernisation programme aimed at rolling out new modernised railway infrastructure for a safer, faster, smoother and world class train service with improved travelling times for Gauteng Metrorail commuters was underway.
“The Pretoria work will involve the replacement of old signals, turnouts and points machines as part of Prasa’s modernisation programme. The benefits of a new modernised infrastructure will be a safer, faster, smoother and world class train service with improved traveling times,” said Metrorail spokesperson Lillian Mofokeng.
An occupation will be taken during this period and trains will be monitored to ensure safe movement of trains. During the construction phase the following train service will apply:
1. Trains from the Saulsville corridor (00), De Wildt corridor (44) and Mabopane (18) will turn around at Bosman Station.
2. All Trains on the Northern side will terminate at Bosman station and Mears Street Station.
3. A Shuttle train service (31s) will run between Mears Street Station and Koedoespoort. Busses will ferry commuters to Bosman Station.
4. Another Shuttle train service (81s) will run between Pienaarspoort to Bosman via Capital Park route.
5. All Johannesburg – Pretoria trains (06s) will turn at Centurion Station, buses will ferry commuters to Bosman Station.
6. The only tickets that will be sold are to commuters traveling between listed Stations.
“Commuters have been advised to adhere to the service announcements made at stations during this period to be familiar with the revised train timetable. We hope that our valuable customers will co-operate and support Metrorail during this construction phase. Metrorail is committed to continually ensure that safety for all within its operational environment is prioritized.
“We are to report that the final testing and commissioning of the newly installed electronic signalling system in the Park Station complex is going well. We have returned many platforms back to operations running with the new system, proving that the transition from the old system to the new electronic interlocking system has been a huge success,” said Mofokeng.
Mofokeng said Prasa understands that this maybe a short term inconvenience but the commuters will benefit from infrastructure improvements in the long term. Our efforts in improving commuters travel is a demonstration that Prasa and its business units are doing something so that South Africans enjoy decent and modern public transport services in the coming weeks, months and years to come….
