Douglasdale Residents Voluntary Association fix potholes on the neighbourhood streets

While many people used the festive holidays to enjoy quality time with their families and friends, some residents of Douglasdale saw a good opportunity to do some maintenance in the neighbourhood.

Owen Hendry, the secretary of DX13 Residents Voluntary Association said the community organisation was established by residents in 2018 following a spike in crime in the area.

“In June 2018, we met as a neighbourhood group and took responsibility for our own safety. We established a neighbourhood watch night patrol team, and contracted a new professional security company to control our access boom and patrol our streets. We liaised with Sanral to keep their property at the corner of William Nicol and the N1 highway, which backs directly onto houses in our suburb, secure from vagrants and clear of vegetation where intruders could hide.

“Residents on this boundary have put up electric fencing and floodlighting on their back walls to protect this perimeter even further. Since then, crime stopped for two and a half years now. There have been just a handful of minor incidents, one of which led to an immediate arrest of the intruder,” said Hendry.

He added that after a successful neighbourhood watch project, residents agreed and decided to fix potholes on the streets that were causing inconvenience for motorists.

“Our street signs and stop signs were rusted and decrepit. Instead of waiting for action from Johannesburg Roads Agency [JRA] to come and fix the streets, we replaced all the signs ourselves. When potholes appeared on our roads, instead of waiting for action from JRA, we bought asphalt and repaired the holes ourselves during the festive season holidays. We also installed more streetlights to discourage unwelcome visitors, and some residents installed CCTV cameras to monitor activity on the roads outside their houses.”