What does it mean for Woodstockians to use the MyCiti bus terminal?

So you’ve heard about the MyCiti bus system, Cape Town’s new rapid bus service. You may even have traveled on one of the routes and marveled at the comfort and smoothness of the system. So what does this mean for people living in Woodstock, which is a fairly large transit point for the MyCiti buses? (All the Table View routes go through Woodstock before continuing into town and further i.e. the Waterfront).

So where exactly is the terminal?

The terminal has been built on the far end of the Woodstock railway station, that is, on the side closest to the sea. The challenge I can foresee for anyone wanting to quickly pop into town, is that the walk to the station from anywhere above Main Road Woodstock is fairly challenging considering you could take your car, or jump into a minibus taxi for R5 anywhere on the Main Rd and you’d be in town immediately. And if you are lugging anything it could be quite strenuous. So for someone coming from Woodstock you can either go through the station all the way across two sets of platforms or you can access the terminal from the bridge after the Castle brewery (after Beach Rd).

The advantage of the MyCiti option of course is that as a feeder route, you could use your R10 ticket to continue on after transferring at the Civic Centre terminal such as the Waterfront at no extra cost (and of course future routes are planned (viewed here) and would make this a stronger alternative. Perhaps more practically, you could cycle to the terminal as you can take your bicycle along as in Europe, though you may have to wait for space during peak times.

The reality, however, is that most people use the service for travelling from Blouberg/Table View into town (including Woodstock) as this route has always been somewhat impractical with existing transportation or even private cars (the Paarden Island turnoff in particular can be a nightmare at times).

What are the costs and when does it run?

The feeder routes are R5 for adults (children under 4 free) and the trunk routes R10 with free transfers to the feeder services. More information can be found here. And it runs every 10 minutes during peak times , else every 20 minutes for the Table View – Civic Centre / Civic Centre – Table View route.

The airport route is R53 for adults (children 4-11 years R26.50, children under 4 – free) which is reasonable (though for some reason the price has just been raised from R50 which was a more practical amount) and runs every 20 minutes between 04:20 and 21:00 daily.

Overall impression

The bus is clean and even fun (public transportion in Cape Town being rather a novelty) and the people working there for the most part friendly. However, I couldn’t help notice the following on the MyCiti webpage: “If you are found without a validated ticket, you could be fined, unless you have a valid explanation. “ I cannot wait to hear some of the excuses that Capetonians will no doubt come up with, that may be worth following up on.

The Myciti homepage.

And here a link to our previous article on Art at the Woodstock Myciti bus terminal.