The City of Cape Town has been recognised with an honourable mention at the 2012 Sustainable Transport Awards in Washington.
Hosted by The Institute for Transportation and Development Policy (ITDP) during its Transport Research Board Conference, the awards honour cities that have developed truly sustainable public transport systems.
Cape Town was nominated along with 16 cities around the world, and received an honourable mention along with Buenos Aires. San Francisco and Medellin were the joint winners. [The other nominees were Jaipur (India), Singapore (Singapore), Antalya (Turkey), Cuenca (Ecuador), Chicago (USA), Lviv (Ukraine), Seoul (South Korea), Jerusalem (Israel), Bihar (India), Fazilka (India), Seville (Spain), Minneapolis (USA), and Chnagwon (South Korea).]
The honourable mention is for the City’s initiatives in implementing sustainable transport practices. This includes the steps taken to implement a non-motorised transport network that provides safe transport links for pedestrians and cyclists as well as its new MyCiTi initiative. In accepting the award on behalf of Cape Town, Mayoral Committee Member for Transport, Roads and Stormwater, Councillor Brett Herron, told the audience it was a great honour for him to be accepting the award.
“Cape Town is still in the infancy of our transportation transformation, or revolution, and we have a long way to go before we achieve our objective of providing an equitable, safe, efficient, affordable, quality public transport service for all,” said Councillor Herron.
“This award, which sees us on stage with some of the world’s greatest cities, is a massive vote of confidence in our pursuit of this objective and is enormously encouraging.
“A quality, integrated public transport system is essential to providing both social and economic inclusion and to achieving our objectives, and delivering on our mandate, which is to build a city that provides opportunity, is safe, is caring, is inclusive and is well-run,” said Councillor Herron.
In coming months, the MyCiTi service will connect the town of Atlantis; which is physically far removed from economic opportunities; as well as the isolated and poor community of Dunoon, to retail, commercial and industrial centres of the city. In so doing, the City will begin supporting the economic and social inclusion of these residents.
The ITDP works with cities worldwide to bring about transport solutions that cut greenhouse gas emissions, reduce poverty, and improve the quality of urban life. They have offices in eight countries.
For more about the award, visit http://www.itdp.org/get-involved/sustainable-transport-award/finalists
