More than 16 months since the access road leading up from Clarence Drive to Steenbras Dam in Gordon’s Bay was severely damaged by flooding, it remains closed off to the public with no envisaged opening date by the City of Cape Town.
“Due to safety concerns, the City cannot allow access (to the public) at this stage,” said the City’s Mayoral Committee member for Water and Sanitation, Councillor Zahid Badroodien.
He confirmed last week that his directorate repaired two damaged sites and the third site is in progress.
“The third repair site requires specialist engineering.
“A preliminary design report was completed which included geotechnical testing, review and recommendation of a proposed design with associated costing. The detailed design and construction phase for the third site is still to be done.”
Helderberg locals, avid walkers and hikers as well as those who frequent the viewpoint at the top of the road continue to express dismay at the lengthy time it is taking for the repair work to be concluded and the road re-opened.
It was closed in December 2022 due to floods that also damaged the R44 (Clarence Drive) at the time (“Thunderstorm causes flooding, wreaks havoc with infrastructure”, 13 December 2022).
Badroodien said no definite date had been set for the completion of the repair and the time frame is envisaged to extend into 2025 as budget becomes available to complete the repair.
“The engineering work for the slope repair is taking longer than anticipated,” said Badroodien, “and a contractor still has to be sourced to undertake the work. For this reason the date was revised to 2025. All efforts are being undertaken to complete this project as quickly as possible.
To date, the City has invested approximately R2,33 million in repairs to this access road.
