When to visit the traffic department

Yesterday, my mom had to mission to Hillstar Traffic Department in Ottery to renew her driver’s licence. Bearing in mind that she hadn’t occupied the driver’s seat of a vehicle since I got my licence 4 years ago, I found it all quite amusing.

Still, I knew from experience that she was in for an afternoon of incredible frustration. No traffic department is complete without long, smelly queues of people, a tattered chair here and there, a limited supply of the precious writing tool called the pen as well as a compliment of staff that look painfully bored and disinterested.

As expected, my mom sat in a long queue up until around half an hour before the department was due to close at 15h30. She had moved at a glacial pace up until that point and didn’t expect to finish in time.

Then, the miraculous happened.

The queue began moving along at ten times the rate it had been all day. Like clockwork, eye tests and fingerprint-taking were conducted efficiently and without fuss.

In a flash, my mother was out of there.

Now, it doesn’t take a mastermind to figure out what the deal was. The reason it takes so long to get yourself in and out of these dreadful government departments is down to a complete lackadaisical effort by those expected to assist you.

As soon as home time approached, the staff kicked themselves into gear and got the job done as it was meant to be; namely, with some bloody vigour!

Sadly, it seems all one can do is avoid the traffic department unless you absolutely have to visit one and when that time comes, be sure to sneak in 30 minutes before it shuts its doors.

The world cup on wheels

The world cup has finally reached its dramatic conclusion. Spain has lifted the trophy for the very first time and most of the colourful foreigners who visited our colourful shores have by now headed home.

It was a truly magical spectacle, the likes of which this country won’t see again for ages. But this is a motoring blog and I am meant to be writing about cars, not vuvuzelas, drunken fans and stadiums with names that nobody from Spain or the Netherlands will be able to pronounce.

The role played by cars and public transportation in this world cup has been nothing short of incredible. In a country often slated for its abysmal public transport network and poor drivers (and rightly so, to be perfectly honest), the issue of traffic congestion was remarkably well-handled.
At work, the office was filled with dread for months before the first match was played – “how would we get to our studio in town? Should we carpool? Whose place should we sleep over at? What time should we leave home? Which roads will be closed? We’re going to dieeeeeeeeeeee!!!!!”

Actually, we were perfectly okay. An extra hour or so of forward-planning was all that was required to negotiate a trouble-free path through town.
The shuttles and new MyCiTi busses provided to transport stadium spectators on match days and in and around the city were smart, readily accessible and extremely efficient.

The MyCiTi busses are bigger and more comfortable

The public were generally well warned about road closures and there were no horror stories horrific enough to bother harping on about.
Perhaps traffic being dramatically stopped at the most impossibly awkward spot on Hospital Bend to allow the France bus and its entourage to pass deserves mention as a poorly executed traffic situation. But what really is worth harping on about were those Dutch fans.

They were hard to miss, what with them being draped in the colour of everybody’s favourite flavour of Fanta – and the fun did indeed find these diehard football fans wherever they went. Even more bizarre were the throngs of Dutch fans crisscrossing provinces in their massive convoys. These were made up of all mode of transportation; I’m talking about motorbikes, camper vans, 4X4s and even double-decker busses. If these grainy pictures don’t do this citrus spectacle any justice, then have a look at this short clip: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uVZozy_hULI


Private vehicles were also used by many to brandish their support for Bafana with mirror socks and flags attached to windows, antennas, roof racks and virtually any part of the car it could affix itself to.
Hilarious were the vastly differing prices these mirror socks could be purchased for – I’ve heard about people paying everything from R50 to R150. No doubt street vendors had a good chuckle each time they made a nice profit but well done to them for being visible on every single street corner - or every piece of tarmac where a vehicle could potentially slow down to a halt.

Mirror socks... the right way up

The flags caused some further drama, however. Initially, many were seen placed upside down on cars, apparently a symbol of “unrest” and “crisis” in the country to which the flag belongs.
Many radio stations took calls from people in their own crisis upon spotting these offending flags when, actually, the innocent lady in her little Yaris was only trying to demonstrate her patriotism and nothing more.

The wealthy also came to the party – many Mercedes-Benz drivers concealed the shiny-lensed indicator repeaters fitted to their rear-view mirrors just to display those mirror socks. While I’m at it – who decided to place indicator lenses within rear-view mirror housings? Flashy, sure. But extravagant, likely ridiculously more expensive to replace and far more prone to damage than traditional lenses placed on the side fenders. Form over function – simple.


What about the trains? It was a great experience to travel home on a packed train at 2am in the morning! Cape Town station has been completely transformed, and one can only hope it stays that way.
These improvements, along with the knowledge that the M3 now packs approximately 12 lanes (at my last attempted count) and Greenpoint has been fitted with a pretty traffic circle, lead us all to hope that it’s the catalyst Cape Town and South Africa needs to launch the road and transport network in South Africa another few notches up the scale.

Last but not least, it should be mentioned that the level of visible law enforcement on our roads was at an all-time peak. Well done to all the traffic officers (and their new, luminescent, LED, blinding blue lights) for doing a great job of keeping everything going smoothly and with mostly minimal fuss.

World Cup 2010 was a true triumph – both on and off the road.