Marlboro or Jack

It makes no difference where you stand as long as you stand for something or sit as in this case. Let us gets some debate going, don’t get me wrong I think the Gautrain is a great system, long overdue but is it for a select few? At Marlboro Station there is a clear cut line between the poor neighbouring suburb of Alexander and the station. I wondered as I entered the clean, secure premises of Marlboro Station, how many staying in those match box houses actually use the Gautrain. A few are benefiting job wise but how many risk their lives daily commuting by informal taxis, staring at the golden train. With the new toll gates coming in to play this may change yet again the perception of the train. So where do you stand in regard with the Gautrain? My loaded question I’m asking is this, is the Gautrain a public or a private transport system?

Gautrain One

I thought I better start posting my monthly update photo of the Gautrain Braamfontein Terminus progress. So here is my first Gautrain related photo of 2011. As you can see not much has changed since the 30 November other than the cloud has lifted slightly. The builders holiday plus rainy weather has also slowed the progress down.

Sophia meets the Gautrain

I was invited to celebrate the arrival of the 81st and last Gautrain rail car at the Midrand Depot. After the speakers and the last rail car arrived with all the fanfare on the back of a flatbed. Later on we all became the first public to ride the Gautrain to the nearly complete Midrand Station. Although we've been so often on the Gautrain, it was like our first time all over. On the 20th of December the train will start running to Pretoria on a number of test runs, which will be just as exciting. Today was a perfect opportunity for Sophia to meet Ms Gautrain 10019, two beautiful creatures meet.

Fog, smog or mist

Arriving into the city centre this morning I found a low cloud rolling in. The mist steadily got thicker and thicker as it pushed towards mid-day. At some point mid morning I could not even see the Gautrain Braamfontein Terminus construction yet alone Park Station. The sun got the better of it during the afternoon and it started to clear-up.

Monthly Progress

It was a busy day of knuckling down and doing some work for a change as tomorrow I will be out of the office all day on a shoot. Subject Top Secret only only for those in the know. You know what I mean. And I am in the know because they want photos of the event. I will leave you with my monthly photo of the progress of the Gautrain Braamfontein terminus.

Stormy Traffic

Last night there were many thunderstorms which cause many accidents during this mornings rush. Here is a photo of one accident of a minibus taxi which jumped a red traffic light outside the Gautrain Braamfontein Terminus and hit a pickup. This caused a back-up for quite a few hours.

Hans and the Gautrain

After a busy day at work, I was wondering how to get my brother-in-law Hans from the airport to my house and be back in time for cell. Matthew was at baseball practice and Carol waiting for him would only be back about six thirty. This gave me no time to drive across town and back before seven thirty. The Gautrain was the answer. I drove my Vespa to the Sandton Station hop onto the Gautrain and was in Rhodesfield before Hans could blink an eye. Soon we were gliding back to Sandton passing frustrated commuters in their cars trying to get home. The longest part of the whole operation was waiting for Carol to pick Hans up at the drop-off zone on West Street. Anyway this was Hans' first experience of the Gautrain so a perfect photo opportunity.

Dark Clouds

Today started like every other without a rain cloud in sight. Matter of fact it was a perfect day to take my usual monthly photo of the Gautrain Terminus building at Braamfontein as you can see. But later in the afternoon dark thunder clouds closed in and Johannesburg had it first real rain of the summer. It even hailed. What a perfect start of summer. You can smell rain soaking into every pore. Welcome summer.

Sesquipedalian

My new word of the day is Sesquipedalian after listening to a chairperson for over two hours use big words and strangely placed quotes. Like this one "There is a Chinese saying that states you can take a donkey to water but you can't make it drink". What, where did this come from? Weren't we talking about Aids Day? And that defiantly is not Chinese that is for sure. Oh and it is a horse, not a donkey, a horse. By the way Mr Chairperson you can make it drink by giving it salt at the water's edge. Old cowboy trick or was that Chinese? I took this photo on my way to the boring meeting in Umjantshi House. It is a different view of the Gautrain Terminus at Braamfontein. I must say there is another interesting word that is for the fear of long words, sesquipedalophobia and if you have it bad like I do then I suffer from hippopotomonstrosesquipedaliophobia.

Easy does it

Thank goodness Monday is under the belt, now for the rest of the week. It is downhill from here. The roof of the Gautrain’s Braamfontein Terminus is nearly completed. Things are coming along nicely.

Roof going on

At the Gautrain Braamfontein Terminus, construction workers are starting to put the roof onto the stations entrance. I wonder how soon this station will be added to Foursquare?

Midday Braamfontein

I got a call today from Carol saying that Telkom has been round and our phone is now up and running. I better check tonight if the DSL is also working. Wow over a month without internet. Not good. Today's photo is of the construction work progress of the Gautrain Braamfontein Terminus in the midday sun.

Always Play it Safe

The Gautrain has been quite a bit in the news lately with its launch of operations last month. But ignoring the new Brothers for Life building wrap on the Schlesinger Building, they did not play it safe with a soft launch. Although they didn't have too, they rushed into operation the Airport-Sandton link just in time for the soccer world cup. Along with this came the teething problems that a soft launch and six months testing would have ironed out. But expectations of the public have all been met and the Gautengers along with hundreds of thousands visitors are very impressed with the Gautrain. We are proud to have what we hope is a start of many new public transport options. In today's photo is the construction of the Braamfontein Terminus of the Gautrain in the early morning light.

Tunnel Rats

Twenty members of the Joburg Photowalkers group got together for a guided tour of the Gautrain's Rosebank Station and part of the tunnel which are still under construction. Thanks for Maritha and Dawie for organizing for us; we had a great time crawling around in the dust tunnels and snapping away at anything that moved.

Teething Gautrain is still Cool

I have been on the newly launch Gautrain a number of times, my first trip being on 13 March 2010, I thought I would treat the family on a trip from Sandton to Rhodesfield and back. And I was not the only family who decided to ride the Gautrain today.

The Sandton ticket area of the Gautrain was packed to the rafters. I joined a queue to purchase our gold cards (tickets) while Carol who is disabled and cannot stand for long periods tried to find somewhere to sit. Eventually she had to ask one of the Gautrain personnel for a chair and was brought a white plastic patio chair. (Gautrain Please Note)

After about 45 minutes of standing in the queue Matthew wanted the toilet but was told that the toilets were on the other side of the barrier and needed a gold card to get in. Luckily it wasn't long after that, I made it to the front of the queue. I will pause here to ask Gautrain why do I have to purchase my three gold cards separately and not as one purchase? This would have shortened my time at the purchase point and that of the other families.

The escalators at Sandton were flying at a great speed which was a problem for Carol to get on but finally we arrived at the platform and did not have to wait very long for a train to arrive. Families with grannies and children were all excited and couldn't wait to board. Matthew managed to find seats for us but a number of people had to be sasified with standing room only. The journey itself was pleasant with our family discussing the differences between the Gautrain, Thalys and the TGV while we flew along the tracks. The main difference that we came up with was the width. The Gautrain felt much smaller and cramped than the European trains that we were used to.

Arriving at Rhodesfield in record time we disembarked and made our way off the platform to the concourse below on an escalator that was thankfully much slower. At the bottom we found many people also trying to purchase gold cards to spend a day in Sandton. The queues looked even longer than in Sandton that we decided not leave the concourse but turn around and head back to Sandton. After another short wait we were flying back.

Trying to leave Sandton Station we encountered our final hurdle. The gates wouldn't let us out because we had inefficient funds on our cards. What? We paid for a round trip to Rhodesfield and back at R52 (R21 one way plus R10 for the card). So we joined another queue of lots of frustrated families with the same problem. Here we expected to standing for an hour or more. Carol had to find a spot on the floor as there was no chairs this side. What had happened was that we should have gone out of the gates at Rhodesfield and back in but no one told us this so we were charged R100 as if we went to the airport. Majority of the commuters did just what we did and simply got off at Rhodesfield, went down to the concourse, went back up on the other side and waited for the train back. Because there was so many of us waiting in a queue to get this problem rectified, they simply let us out. A quick fix to what would have been another long wait.

This was to be a wonderful experience for the family but I don't think Gautrain was ready for hordes of people seeking their first ride on what had become their dream. But the dream is still alive because this is our train and we are proud of her, teething problems and all. As Matthew's T-shirt reads “Belgium is cool, I'm cool”, we say that the Gautrain is even cooler.

Gautrain after Eight

Gautrain's tag line is "Dreams Do Come True" and I must say that it does as once again we twitterers managed to get on the Gautrain but this time riding the lines way after the lights out time and was still out speeding along at 160kph after 11pm. Luckily we got back just before our carriages turned into pumpkins at the stroke of midnight. I don't think that the Gautrain will be allowed out again at this time. This historic event was the official launch of Gautrain operations. We first had a wonderful evening of entertainment at Gallagher Estate and after that boarded buses to take us to the depot. Once on board we sped to OR Tambo, Rhodesfield, Marlboro and Sandton Stations and cut ribbons to officially open the stations. There was a big difference between the foreign and local media with the crazy social media group. I was even interviewed by e-TV going 160kph. We had fun as you can see in today's photo is Nicole Flint, Miss South Africa 2009 aka Official_MissSA on twitter, posing with the Gautrain at OR Tambo Station. Thank you Maritha for getting the twitterati onboard

Counting Sleeps

It is just two more sleeps until the launch of operations of Gautrain. The closer we come to the big soccer event the more the general public are getting into the thrill of it. Flags are fluttering everywhere even our ICT office at Metrorail is filled with flags hanging from the ceilings. The soccer teams have started to arrive and the fans from this weekend. We live in interesting times. I normally post a photo of the progress of the Gautrain terminus in Braamfontein at the beginning of the month and I did a lovely early morning photo less than a week ago (Dawn of a New Age) but I thought I better do another day one.

Dawn of a New Age

With just less than two weeks until the Gautrain is officially between Johannesburg International and Sandton, Gautrain releases the cost of the fares to the public. The black tie launch event is around the corner and I’m not going, sniff sniff, not even as a date. Anyway I will leave you this photo I took this morning of the Gautain Terminus in Braamfontein.

Strike Day Four

It is Day Four of the PRASA strike and things are looking better with the negotiations. Todays photo is of the new Gautrain Parkade in Braamfontein from the entrance to Umjantshi House. We are having problems with the Telkom DSL again at home so my future posts will be erratic until fixed.

Blue Skies

I had started to forget how blue Johannesburg winter skies are with all this rain we been having. It was a good day to take a progress photo of Gautrain's Braamfontein Terminus. The section between the airport and Sandton is opening on the 8 June which is only 34 days away.