Letter: Nit-picking over building plans stalls progress

Dave Williams of Ballito writes:

My son, an architectural employer, gave my wife and I drawings and plenty of paperwork required for a 1,8m high wall that was wanted to replace a palisade fence wall between two blocks of flats in Ballito. He said we should just drop these off at the municipal offices. These my wife took one afternoon off only to find out they are only open between 8.30am and 12.30pm.

I therefore took these plans and drawings at 11am. I however could not just offload them. They were opened and after more than half an hour I was given two lists of additional requirements drawn up by two people. They were very polite and helpful but I felt that they had a lot of time on their hands and were therefore overzealous and were nit-picking for such a small addition.

I am told that a number of people in Ballito have made additions to their buildings without town planning. I know of only one! They are keeping builders and workers operating! I am also told that buyers of these modified property buildings will not get a bond without new building plans unless these can be circumvented by corruption. Is this occurring?

When I queried the above with an owner his reply was that he would wait for the ANC to be voted out of power before he submitted building plans to the next political party in power. He might wait a long time!

Furthermore, the officials in the planning office informed me that the requirements for building additions or modification are drawn up by each municipality and are not universal countrywide. So, requirements by one municipality differ from all other municipalities. All I can say is that service delivery by KwaDukuza building planning office should be made as simple as possible so that people can work in this environment.

PS: It is nearly three months since plans for the dividing wall were submitted to the planning office. Who is causing the delay and why is there such a long delay? Because our winter weather is ideal to keep builders working!