Parkmore holds its breath as city entities set a new date for sinkhole visit

Parkmore residents are hoping that a long-promised site visit by Johannesburg Roads Agency (JRA) will final take place this month.
This is as ongoing sinkhole and storm water drainage issues continues to worsen along Victoria Avenue. The issue, which has persisted for over a decade at the corner 4th Street and Victoria Avenue and the corner 5th Street and Victoria Avenue, has seen repeated delays in co-ordinated action between JRA and Johannesburg Water (JW), leaving residents increasingly frustrated and concerned about safety.

Read more: Chaplin Street sinkhole fully repaired as JRA completes final tar work

Last year September, JW reported that they had previously investigated the site, and confirmed the water feeding the sinkhole was not from the municipal pipeline, but from a borehole on a private property.

In October last year, JRA logged a service request, indicating exploratory excavations would be conducted to confirm the source of the leak. JRA confirmed that it had communicated with JW and a joint site inspection was scheduled for the last week of February. However the inspection did not take place. New dates were set, but were not met, with JRA attributing the delays to JW.

Also read: Parkmore sinkhole crisis finally sees action after long-awaited joint inspection

“JRA has been available to undertake the site visits,” said a spokesperson, “as we indicated in the date I had previously communicated to you. We have scheduled a new date for the joint site visit, which is April 9, for the site assessments. However, JW is best positioned to respond on factors that impacted our planned site visits.”

The publication reached out to JW for a comment as to the cause of the delays on March 31, April 1, and April 2, but no comment was received by the time of print. Updates will be provided once they become available.

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