Google Maps will no longer direct visitors through Cape Town township after attacks on motorists

Tourism Minister Patricia de Lille and Prof Alistair Mokoena, country director for Google South Africa, signed a collaborative agreement in Parliament on Monday aimed at promoting South Africa as a safe tourist destination.

This follows incidents of stone-throwing and attacks on motorists on and near the N2 in recent months.

On 3 November, a 55-year-old tourist from Connecticut in the US was shot in the face and robbed soon after leaving Cape Town International Airport. A navigation app on his phone reportedly indicated that the most direct route to Cape Town was through the Nyanga township, News24 reported.

At Monday’s signing of the agreement, Mokoena said Google had been in touch with city officials and had identified crime hotspots. These included Nyanga and the intersection at the airport, which would soon no longer be recommended by Google as the fastest routes to the city.

https://youtu.be/3dZIjZT7_wQ

Speaking to Daily Maverick at Parliament, Mokoena said Google considered driver and commuter safety to be a priority.

“Google is a tool to connect you with your destination in the fastest and safest possible time. So when it comes to recommending routes, we look at what is the fastest possible way to get you from point A to point B… we look at the nature of the road, the quality of the road – we also look at safety,” said Mokoena.

Mokoena said that “the first area [of] focus will be Nyanga because we have had a couple of incidents and seen an increase in violent crimes there.

“We want to make sure that we don’t have this sort of [thing] recurring. Recommendations have not yet gone live to exclude the Nyanga area route from the airport intersection as the fastest feature...

“We are working with all the role players, including car rental companies, to ensure that everybody is warned, everybody is given information, because once you have been given information, you are empowered to make informed decisions.

“We are coming in from a tech perspective, but the city is putting up signage… there will be a marketing and a comms campaign to alert people of dangers to ensure that we have a great tourism experience,” said Mokoena.

Read more on Daily Maverick: Visitors warned to be alert on Cape Town’s N2 ‘Hell Run’

• In March 2023, Leonie van der Westhuizen died after a rock shattered the car window and struck her in the head, triggering cardiac arrest. The Van der Westhuizens were reportedly directed by Google Maps via Nyanga because their planned route was closed.


• In July, a 21-year-old student from Inscape in Stellenbosch, Lucilla Vlok, had her jaw fractured when a rock was hurled through her car window while she was driving on the N2 to Cape Town International Airport.


• Most recently, in October, Los Angeles couple Jason and Kate Zoladz were heading to Cape Town International Airport via Philippi when a brick shattered the car window, forcing them to stop. Four men approached their rental car and robbed them at gunpoint.

 

‘It’s nothing new’

De Lille confirmed that the tourism department had developed a solution with Google.

“In terms of using technology, for me, it started way back in 2014 when the City of Cape Town became the most-desired city in the world.

“The first thing we did was to design an open data portal, which was also a first for the city. I made sure that we overlaid all our decisions, at all levels, at all departments in the city, with digital technology. That’s when I realised the value of this and how easy it is.

De Lille added: “For me, it’s nothing new. I think it is compulsory for government to use technology. I have just attended the world travel market in London, where they were speaking about artificial intelligence and how the tourism sector is using AI.

“The quicker we can pick up the technology, the better it will be for the sector,” she said. DM