South Africa's first high-speed train to operate in major cities in August

JOHANNESBURG: South Africa's first high-speed train will begin operating between Hatfield in Pretoria and Rosebank in Johannesburg and Pretoria on Aug 2, the Gauteng provincial Transport Minister Ismail Vadi said.

The first phase of the Gautrain, between Sandton in northern Johannesburg and the city's OR Tambo International Airport has been opened in June 2010, ahead of the FIFA World Cup in South Africa.

While, the tunnel section between Rosebank and Park station in central Johannesburg will be opened later, since it requires extra engineering and construction by contractors to deal with water seepage, Vadi said in media briefing.

The South African Press Association (SAPA) reported that water seeping into one of the Gautrain tunnels in that section, will be pumped into the nearby Sandspruit River at a rate of six million litres a day.

Until now, only small amounts of the water have been pumped into the river.

"An attempt would be made to fix the water seepage problem by drilling holes into the tunnel floor and injecting low viscosity grout into the rock," he said, adding that the section will operate by end of this year. — Bernama