CAPE TOWN – Residents, businesses, and community members of Muizenberg are invited to attend a community meeting today at 17:30 at the Muizenberg Civic Centre. The meeting will focus on the latest phase of upgrades at Muizenberg Beach.
At the meeting the project team tasked with handling the beach upgrades will give those attending the latest updates about the project and there will be an opportunity to ask questions.
Construction background
The refurbishment project, which began in February last year, aims to replace aging seawalls and deliver major upgrades to public amenities.
The initiative has now reached a critical stage requiring the fencing off of large sections of the beachfront for public safety.
A large crane was installed at Surfer’s Corner to place concrete precast units for the new promenade walkway, resulting in the closure of nine parking bays for approximately three months.
So far about 15% of the concrete precast units have already been placed and the contractor was expected to start dismantling four beach huts on the western side of the beachfront next week, while the huts on the eastern side were scheduled for removal by mid-year.
The City thanked the community and visitors for their ongoing support and patience.
Heritage-preservation priority
The replacement of the eight historic beach huts forms part of the promenade upgrade, and the new huts will be set approximately 2 m further back from the sea, in response to climate-change impacts, including rising sea levels and storm surges.
The decision to erect new huts results from public consultations, which determined that the current huts would not be the same after their dismantling, storing and reconstruction, so replacing them was the more sensible practical option.
Beach Hut Trust (BHT) spokesperson Angela Gorma said: “The City has confirmed that the eight existing iconic huts will be replaced with eight new huts, carefully designed to match the historic look, patterns and colours of the originals, so their familiar character is retained.”
The new huts will be relocated further towards the central plaza area, where they’ll provide additional wind shelter for central shower facilities.
Construction reaches intensive phase
The ambitious beachfront refurbishment, which began in February last year, is now fully underway, with the current demolition of ablution buildings and expanded fencing planned for work areas.
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