Hundreds of pedestrians, including children, must navigate Broadlands Road in Strand every morning to commute to work and school.

With two pedestrian fatalities already recorded this year, local business owners and parents are sounding the alarm over a stretch of road they describe as a “death trap”.

The daily reality is one of constant anxiety for road users. A local business owner who witnesses the chaos daily says the current state of the road makes even driving hazardous.

“Every morning I feel like I’m risking my life when I drive to work. I’m scared that I might hit a child and the community will turn on me,” he said.

The business owner shared harrowing video footage of an accident earlier this year, when a truck knocked down a pedestrian, who died instantly.

Flowers and a cross on the side of the road serve as a everyday reminder of the tragedy.

“The road is constantly breaking apart, no matter how many times they fix it. Heavy trucks sometimes park on the side of the road, further endangering pedestrians as other cars pass,” he said.

This sentiment is echoed by parents in the area. One parent, who asked not to be named, noted that the official death toll tells only part of the story.

“Accidents are frequent and not always fatal,” she said, highlighting incidents of near-misses and minor collisions that don’t always make headlines.

But relief is not coming soon. The City of Cape Town confirmed that full reconstruction of the road is only scheduled to begin in February 2029, with completion set for March 2031.

Despite recent fatalities, the City does not officially classify Broadlands Road as a “high-accident zone”. According to the the municpality’s Transport Planning and Network Management Department, data captured between 2020 and 2025 shows six fatalities on the route.

When compared to other high-risk corridors across the metro, the City maintains the road doesn’t meet the threshold for “hotspot” status.

Rob Quintas, Mayoral Committee member for Urban Mobility, acknowledged the road’s defects, but said it’s currently managed through “reactive maintenance”.

“Broadlands Road is one of the roads that we continuously maintain via our weekly routine maintenance plan,” he explained. “The depot will continue to monitor and maintain this road until reconstruction has commenced.”

The primary danger cited by residents and motorists is the total lack of pedestrian walkways.

As Broadlands Road serves as an industrial artery, children are forced to share the narrow asphalt with large trucks. Vehicles are also forced to swerve to avoid deep potholes and crumbling road shoulders.

When asked why a simple pavement cannot be installed immediately, Quintas pointed to a geographical bottleneck. “The Broadlands Road reserve is very narrow and does not have sufficient width to accommodate a pavement currently,” he explained. The City’s long-term plan involves piping the existing open canal and constructing a pavement on top of it – an engineering feat bundled into the 2029 reconstruction project.

Those hoping for speedbumps to protect pedestrians will be disappointed. Under council’s Traffic Calming Policy, Broadlands Road is considered a Class 3 mobility-focused route.

“Traffic calming is not permitted on a route of that nature,” Quintas said, though he highlighted that a signalised pedestrian crossing was recently installed on nearby Broadway Road to assist with school-related foot traffic.

Quintas argued that building a temporary pavement now would constitute “wasteful expenditure”, as it would likely be placed incorrectly relative to the final 2029 design.

“The space simply does not accommodate a pavement at the moment.”

The community must wait three more years for construction to begin and five years for a finished, safer road. Until then, the City urges the public to report potholes and defects, promising that emergency teams are on standby to patch up as the need arises.