State of Kensington worrying

Editor – I could start with a long dialogue about how important it is for residents to engage in cleaning and maintaining Kensington.

Equally, you could get a diatribe about how disgusting pedestrians and people in cars are, considering the rubbish discarded by them especially along main roads such as Langermann Drive. Or I could go on about the superficiality of the services provided by City Parks and Pikitup. Then again, I could berate you with examples of city contractors and services such as Eskom, JRA and Telkom who always seem to make things look much worse whenever a job is done.

Then again, I could point out how much of the mess is created by lazy people dumping bags of rubbish on the grass verge, not to forget inconsiderate and/or lazy residents leaving piles of left-over building materials such as sand and gravel, and of course the remains of rubble not removed.

Against such a backdrop it is hardly surprising that the ideal of increasing residents’ engagement with keep Kensington clean is somewhat a forlorn hope in a sea of degeneration.

But hope springs eternal, maybe.

Well, maybe not quite, but every little helps, or so I thought looking at the access cover discarded on my grass verge.

It is one of those composite material covers implemented by JRA so that the metal thieves will move onto something else, such as my driveway gate maybe.

Those covers were initially an example of a great idea, which was poorly implemented. Whatever the problem, materials or manufacture, they did not do the job, often disintegrating within weeks; you can see that I am correct by the piled up monument of several such broken covers on the northern corner of Ocean and Langermann Drive.

It has been piling up for more than two years now. So when I spotted one on my side of the road, I decided that I would nip it in the bud before it became a twin to the monument across the road.

I put it into the public bin right there at the intersection. The next day the bin was emptied and the broken cover was dumped onto the pavement next to the bin. Ever persistent, I put it back into the bin. Four days later it was back on the pavement.

A silver lining here, at least the bins are being emptied quite frequently.

It is back in the bin this morning and I am watching.

So you see, engagement is needed, but it is not going to work if it is one-sided. Somehow, the job of those responsible has to be shifted from input (simple task) to output (improve the appearance of the suburb).

Just how you do that, I do not know. In the meantime, I will continue to do just enough to ensure that rats, used condoms and left over food is not found outside my property, all of which can be seen on almost any day if one takes a walk.

ROB.

Editor’s comment – Ms Bertha Peters-Scheepers from the JRA commented as follows: The JRA investigated the corner of Langermann and Ocean Street on February 5. Our investigations did not reveal any JRA defects or covers lying around at this location. Next to the traffic light are two small Johannesburg Water valve covers and this is possibly what the complainant may be referring to. Apart from these covers, the intersection is very clean as Pikitup is routinely cleaning the area. We trust this responds to the issues at hand. Alternatively, the complainant is welcome to contact us and arrange for an on-site meeting with the inspector.

Editor’s comment – Mr Pynee Chetty from Telkom commented as follows: If Telkom works on sidewalks or any area owned by the municipality, we have to apply for a way leave. The municipality allocates a timeframe in which the work to be conducted has to be completed. We do repairs and if there is civil work to be done, this is contracted out. The contractor should leave the area in the condition it was in before the work started. We have inspectors. The work is checked and must conform to certain standards. If Telkom has done something wrong, this should be reported to us. Kensington is an old suburb. We have infrastructure underground. All our work is done underground and there is no reason to be digging above ground.

–Editor’s comment – Eskom said it could not comment as Kensington is not within its area of supply.