The driver of a Miley Cyrus tour bus died and one passenger was injured after the vehicle veered off the road and flipped over, police in Virginia said Friday.

Teen icon Cyrus was not on board the bus when it crashed south of Petersburg in Dinwiddie County, Virginia State Police said.

The driver of the bus, William Douglas, 53, of Austin, Texas, died at the scene. Marty Zilio, 48, of Canada, suffered minor injuries, police said.

Convoy

Police said the vehicle was travelling in a convoy of four vehicles carrying concert production crew to Greensboro, North Carolina where Cyrus is due to perform on Sunday.

Cyrus, who was not travelling in the convoy at the time, said in a statement on her website Friday she was “deeply saddened” by the death.

“We are deeply saddened by the loss of Bill ‘Uncle Bill’ Douglas. Members of our tour are like members of our family,” she said.

“Our thoughts and prayers go out to his family in the midst of this tragedy. He will truly be missed.”

- AFP

The Johannesburg Roads Agency says that the roads in and around the city will be of a world class standard ahead of the 2010 FIFA World Cup.

“We expect thousands of visitors during the World Cup period so we have to make sure that we have not only safe roads but a world class infrastructure,” the agency’s spokesperson, Advocate Thulani Makhubela said on Tuesday.

He said that despite the current economic meltdown, which had affected almost everyone in the country, as the city’s roads agency they were still on track to complete the roads and construction on time.

Visitors would be left with an experience of the world class city, he added.

The city’s road infrastructure is expected to be on par, if not better, with the standard of Germany’s roads when it hosted the tournament in 2006 as well as France’s roads when it hosted it in 1998.

The agency has begun a major project to resurface roads, build side walks next to the city’s busiest roads, patching up potholes and installing traffic signals. As part of road maintenance, the agency will inject about R49m in repairing and replacing storm-water pipes.

For the event itself, the agency will further install anti-interrupted power system to avoid the switching-off of traffic lights in the city’s busiest streets and intersections during the world biggest sporting event.

About R10m will be spent on setting up tourism signs and temporary directional signs at venues such as Ellis Park, training grounds, team base camps as well park and ride facilities. – Proffesor Ndawonde, BuaNews

Also view:

• Road Safety towards 2010

A man was arrested in Bramley, Johannesburg on Thursday for allegedly hijacking a truck filled with computers, Gauteng police said.

About seven armed men hijacked the truck at 10am on the N3 offramp near Linbro Park and threw the driver out, Inspector Moses Maphakela said.

The driver called the police after the gang left the offramp. Police saw it and gave chase. Some of the thieves followed the truck in a Golf 5 and a Nissan hardbody.

Maphakela said the men were armed with pistols and, while being chased, had a blue light similar to that used by police officers.

Police pursued the men to Bramley where they arrested a 32-year-old man driving the truck. The others escaped.

The truck and its cargo of R8-million worth of computers were recovered.

The 32-year-old man would be charged with hijacking and possession of stolen property. He would appear in court soon. – Sapa

Cape Town has won the 2009 Virgin Holidays Responsible Tourism Award, in the Best Destination category.

The award was accepted during a function at the World Travel Market in London by deputy mayor Ian Neilson, the city said in a statement.

Congratulating Cape Town Tourism and other tourism industry roleplayers, Neilson said the award belonged to them after all their hard work to put the Responsible Tourism Charter in place.

“Cape Town is ready to greet the world during 2010,” Neilson said.

Mansoor Mohamed, the city’s director for economic and social development and tourism, said Cape Town had also won Africa’s Leading Destination Award for the second consecutive year.

In the Virgin awards, it beat 35 other nominations.

Also view:

• Road Safety towards 2010
• Road Safety Advice for foreigners driving in South Africa

A woman was killed when she was thrown from her rolling car on the N2 south bound carriageway near Umhlali late last night, according to Netcare911.

Netcare911 Paramedics from Richards Bay were transferring a patient from The Bay Hospital to a Durban facility when they happened upon the accident.

They found the critically injured woman lying face down in the middle of the freeway, the crumpled remains of her car were visible in the distance.

They worked fervently to stabilise her and called for assistance. Netcare911 Paramedics from Ballito responded and rushed the woman to the Netcare Alberlito Hospital.

She sustained massive head trauma died as a result of her injuries shortly after arrival.

It is thought that she had been travelling towards Durban when she hit a water patch and lost control of the car.

A man witnessed the death of his wife when she was hit by a luxury SUV as she crossed the M13 west bound carriageway at the foot of Fields Hill this morning, according to Netcare911.

It is thought that the two had braved traffic and attempted to cross the busy motorway. The man managed to make it through and when his wife was in the middle of the roadway she was struck by a BMW X5.

She was dragged over 80m before the car came to a stop. She sustained polytraumatic injuries and was declared dead by medics at the scene. Her distraught husband was counselled by Netcare911 Paramedics at the scene.

The Rea Vaya Bus Rapid Transit system in central Johannesburg has been canned for the rest of the year because of “poor patronage”, the city said on Monday.

“The city of Johannesburg will temporarily withdraw the inner city circle routes of the Rea Vaya BRT system due to a number of challenges,” it said in a statement.

“The inner city service has… not been well patronised, attracting at best 200 passengers per day.”

A probe into the cause of the problem revealed that commuters preferred to walk.

It was a faster means of getting around due to the “severe traffic congestion and poor traffic control” in the inner city.

There were not many ticket vendors and those who agreed to sell the tickets were wary of advertising the sales on their shop fronts.

The obstruction of bus stops by parked cars and poorly identified stops were cited as further reasons for the poor use of the service.

“I have instructed my team to immediately begin with a redesign of the CBD service that would much better serve public demand and will also link the trunk services to high density business areas such as Braamfontein,” said Rehana Moosajee, the member of the mayoral committee on transport.

She said the city was in talks with the metro police to help clear the areas around bus stops, to improve policing of BRT lanes and to help to improve traffic congestion in general in the inner city.

BRT in the inner city will stop running on Wednesday, with plans to roll out the service again in the first quarter of 2010.

The BRT system has been beset by problems since its introduction at the end of August, with taxi operators perceiving it as a threat to their businesses.

Two buses were shot at in the first month of operations.

A month later, Moosajee’s home was attacked and a security guard, specially assigned to her because of taxi industry threats over BRT, was wounded.

This prompted Transport Minister Sbu Ndebele to warn that “no number of threats” would stop the BRT system from going ahead.

- Sapa

A security guard was shot dead in a car on the N7 highway near Montague Gardens, Cape Town police said on Monday.

“The guards were changing shifts around 21:00 on Sunday when a shot went off in a stationary patrol vehicle. A 42-year-old guard, Norman Benjamin, died at the scene,” said spokesperson Inspector Daphne Dell.

Two of the guards, putting on bulletproof vests at the time, ran away, but one of them came back.

Dell said the other guard was found and taken in for questioning.

“It is unclear at this stage what happened. We are investigating a case of murder.”

- SAPA

A hijacker was shot dead on Sunday during a confrontation with police at a parking lot in Pinetown, paramedics in KwaZulu Natal said.

Netcare 911 Spokesman Jeff Wicks said the man was being monitored by police while trying to hijack the car.

“He was shot in the chest during a confrontation with the police and died at the scene,” said Wicks

- SAPA

The M1 North was closed to traffic at the Empire road onramp on Sunday afternoon following a 20 car pile-up, said Johannesburg metro police.

“Twenty cars have been involved in the accident. The road is completely closed… completely blocked off so we urge motorists to use the Glenhove and Joe Slovo onramps,” said Chief Superintendent Wayne Minnaar.

No-one was injured in the accident, he said. The cause of the crash was not known.

- SAPA