Ratepayers fear waste-filled stream might lead to flooding
Residents who live near a stream full of waste are concerned that seasonal rain might flood their homes if the metro does not find a sustainable solution to the problem.
Ratepayers in the Moot fear the waste-filled stream might soon lead to flooding in the area.
Rekord spoke to several residents who chose to remain anonymous.
A resident living in Ben Swart Street is expecting the Tshwane metro to do something about the illegal settlement and waste pickers in the area.
Taxpayers expect their plea to be heard before the seasonal rains worsen the current situation of the body of water being slowed down and strewn with rubbish.
“With the amount of waste currently in the stream, it will fill the stream running under 21st Avenue and block the entire stream, causing it to flood the street as well as three living units closest to the stream,” explained the resident.
According to residents, this possible scenario can be attributed to especially the waste pickers who, as they sort through their collections for the day, discard unwanted objects into the stream, including bottles, polystyrene holders and all their waste.
“Every year with the seasonal rains, water runs down the stream and any items lying in the spruit are carried along the stream. It is a real recipe for disaster.”
This is the opinion of a concerned citizen who lives near the spruit on 21st Avenue to the north of Ben Swart Street.
The resident feels with the seasonal rains, all the trash dumped into the stream by the illegal occupants will get stuck in the natural growth in the spruit right in front of the houses and complexes in the area.
Another resident who has been living in the area since before 2020, explained that the illegal occupation of the spruit and the area around it started with the number of informal waste pickers steadily increasing in the Moot area since the Covid-19 lockdown.
“At the beginning of 2023, one or two of these individuals started living informally and illegally next to the spruit in Ben Swart Street on the west of the corner of Frates Road and Ben Swart between 21st and 22nd avenues. The numbers grew and the informal settlers started making huge bonfires in the fields which is a direct violation of municipal regulations,” explained the resident.
Another resident said numerous complaints about the stream and the informal settlement springing up around the embankments and the area were sent to the metro and the police were called a couple of times to remove them, which the authorities duly did.
“Either later that same day or the following day they would be back and continue to illegally live there and make smaller fires to draw less attention to themselves,” explained the resident.
What concerns this resident, is that during the same time as the informal settlement started to grow, power cable theft tripled in Rietfontein and there was an increase in the number of houses that criminals were breaking into.
“Residents in 21st Avenue are patrolling the streets on a daily basis now,” said the resident.
The suspicions of residents that this spike in crime can be attributed to the informal settlement and the waste pickers have been reported to the metro.
“I am convinced the bin pickers are ideal informants as they know exactly which houses are soft targets or which properties are easily accessible, where and how, and they know when residents are at home or not,” said one concerned resident.
Residents are also worried about the real risk to the traffic in the area posed by overloaded trolleys in the street at all times of the day, and the trail of waste and rubbish left behind.
Adding to these frustrations, residents said there is also a lot of dumping of waste by the waste pickers next to the spruit.
According to the community, the amount of rubbish just gets more, especially on 21st Avenue, to the south of Ben Swart Street, where there are two complexes next to where the waste pickers stay and dump their rubbish.
Residents feel the metro should find a more sustainable solution than merely just removing the illegal settlers and waste pickers when they are reported.
Tshwane was asked to comment on sustainable solutions to the problem, but none was received at the time of publication.
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