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Train station a ghost of itself, with the departure boards always not working. There are no trains to Johannesburg even, and the ones to nearby Simon's Town are too dangerous to take, especially for foreigners. "You must be joking," I said to a local when he told me this. "No, I'm not," he firmly replied. "The security guards have no guns. They are scared."

A news story from 1/25/20:

Just 32 trains left in Cape Town after latest fire destroys carriages, locomotive

Cape Town's depleted fleet of trains went from 33 to 32 on Saturday when six carriages and a motor coach went up in flames.

The train caught fire between Kentemade and Century City stations, said City of Cape Town fire and rescue spokesperson Jermaine Carelse.

The train had no passengers on board and no injuries were reported, but the fire was a fresh blow to a commuter rail service that has lost dozens of trains to arson attacks.

Firefighting efforts had to wait for the electricity to be cut to overhead power lines after a train caught fire between Kentemade and Century City stations, in Cape Town, on January 25 2020.

Speaking in Cape Town on Thursday, Passenger Rail Agency of SA administrator Bongisizwe Mpondo said the city had about a third of the trains it needed to run an adequate service.

Services had been suspended on the city's central line, he said, because the remaining rolling stock could not be risked on a line where live cables dangle across the tracks and where a train is vulnerable to armed criminals if it breaks down.

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