Residents from Parktown and neighbouring suburbs took to Jan Smuts and Loch avenues today to voice their frustrations about not having reliable water for more than 200 days.

Parktown West representative Cheryl Stevens said the action was part of other protests taking place in Brixton, Melville and Kensington.

Read more: Civil society demands action over Johannesburg’s water crisis

“This protest is motivated by 210 days of unreliable water supply to the higher-lying parts of Parktown, which means we don’t have municipal water for 90% of the time,” she said. “We will continue to protest because this doesn’t only affect Parktown but the rest of the country.”

Ninety-three-year-old resident Gilly Pirow said the lack of water was affecting her tremendously. “I can’t bathe when I want to bathe or clean and wash the dishes. The situation is demoralising and has made me eat more takeouts which is expensive but ideal because in that way I don’t have to wash dishes.”

In a media statement released yesterday, Johannesburg Water said the water supply systems were severely constrained with high demand and excessive draw-off limiting the recovery of reservoirs and towers.

“Johannesburg Water acknowledges the frustration experienced by affected residents,” the entity stated. “Technical teams are actively reconfiguring the network and implementing targeted throttling to balance available supply, support reservoir recovery and stabilise distribution across affected systems.”

Also read: Johannesburg Water continues battle with water on Glenhazel’s Northfield Avenue

These interventions include adjusting waterflows and pressures to manage available storage and improve supply to struggling parts of the network. “Customers may experience reduced pressure or temporary supply interruptions while these measures are underway,” the entity added.

Systems experiencing constraints or requiring active management include:

• Central: Parktown, Berea, Yeoville and Linksfield,
• Commando: Crosby, Brixton and Hursthill supply areas, and
• Randburg-Roodepoort: Honeydew, Cosmo City and Waterval Tower.

The extent of interruptions varies across these supply areas, with higher-lying areas particularly impacted when reservoir and tower levels decline.

The publication sent Johannesburg Water further questions for an update on the situation of the reservoirs in Parktown and the surrounding areas, but is yet to receive a response.

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