City of Joburg unveils plans to improve JRA infrastructure

08 November 2017

 

Roads in the City of Johannesburg are set to undergo a major overhaul to ensure safer travelling for residents.

The City aims to achieve this in four years. "We as the new administration want to ensure that we deliver improved and better roads by 2021," said Executive Mayor Herman Mashaba.

 

"We want to ensure that we are a responsive, accountable and responsible government."

"Gone are the days of quick fixes on our roads, with such bad road infrastructure, we will embark on a mission to resurface and reconstruct our current roads, and this is a process, not an event so we must all understand that it cannot happen overnight."

Addressing a media briefing on Tuesday, 7 November 2017, to highlight the status quo of the Johannesburg infrastructure, City of Johannesburg's Member of Mayoral Committee for Transport, Cllr Nonhlanhla Makhuba, underlined the deteriorating state of City roads.

"The 2017 Roads Condition Index indicates major deterioration in the condition of Johannesburg roads," said MMC Makhuba.

Furthermore, good surfaced roads have decreased to 45%, poor surfaced roads increased to 32%, ad-hoc maintenance is required. Gravel roads also require reshaping and re-gravelling. A total of R11.8 billion is required to address this backlog.

The City's sidewalks have also taken a knock over the years with a total of 18 000 km needing urgent attention, at a cost of R2 billion, with no budget available in the current financial year. A further R 6.5 billion is required to attend to 902 deteriorating City bridges. About 37 bridges have collapsed in rainy seasons in four years.

"Even our good bridges are currently bad. Over 78% of bridges are in a poor or very poor condition, this means the condition of the bridges has deteriorated to an alarming state," warned the MMC.

Dams, catchments and storm water also pose a risk to communities, R61.2 billion will be required to deal with this threat. Preventative measures have been put in place to deal with cable theft, such as reducing copper content of traffic signal cable.

Geometric design changes are being considered to deal with accident damage. The value of road furniture such as man-hole covers and signage will be reduced by using materials with no scrap value.