Craighall Residents’ Association raises concerns about overall infrastructure

Craighall residents’ plea to reinstate a six-month-old excavation on the corner of Clarence and Buckingham avenues in Craighall Park continues to fall on deaf ears.
The residents’ association’s Samantha Herman said they are concerned about the infrastructure across the board.

“The hole was dug on August 9 following a burst pipe under the road. This hole was reported numerous times to the City of Johannesburg, to no avail. Together with our ward councillor, Martin Williams, [we] have been communicating with Joburg Water and Joburg Roads since day one but nothing has been done for over six months.”

Ward 90 councillor, Martin Williams agreed that he escalated the matter on numerous occasions since August last year.
“It was a Joburg Water excavation, but the Johannesburg Roads Agency (JRA) has the responsibility to reinstate it. Additionally, the JRA is responsible for repairing the stormwater pipe there.”

Williams added that he asked for a site meeting with JRA, tentatively set for February 6. The residents’ association was also keen to attend, to seek a practical solution as soon as possible.

He noted that there were far too many of these excavations across the ward and the whole city.

The first article regarding the neglected excavation appeared in the Gazette on December 22.

Joburg Water’s spokesperson Nombuso Shabala explained that the turnaround time for backfilling was five days, and for reinstatements, it was 10 days.
“However, these turnaround times are affected by various issues, including the magnitude of the work to be performed. Some backfilling and reinstatement jobs are done internally by our teams, and the medium to large-scale jobs are outsourced using service providers.”
She added that the water entity currently has about 7 000 outstanding backfilling and reinstatement jobs that were subject to resource availability, as well as being impacted by adverse weather conditions.

Herman added that the association continued to privately fix the potholes through resident donations and time.
“We also get the privately owned Discovery Dial Direct Pothole Patrol to help whenever possible. It is a continuous battle with the City of Joburg as we need them to do the job that they are paid for through our rates and taxes.”

Related Article: Johannesburg Water to liaise with Johannesburg Roads Agency to fix unsafe excavation