Gideon J Volschenk, Somerset West
After I had read Jan Brand’s “pretty pavement” letter (Bolander, October 5), as well as Councillor Pringle’s rejoinder, I took a drive up Gordon Road to view the upgrades which the councillor mentioned.
Needless to say, I could not find any upgrades, which confirms Mr Pringle’s allegation that “the City is most certainly not squandering residents’ money” here; the City has, as far as I could make out, not spent a single penny on upgrading Gordon Road…
On my above-mentioned exploratory drive, I went as far as Erinvale, and saw that someone must have spent a pretty penny on upgrading the pavements adjoining Lourensford Road.
Pavements which do not carry more than a few dozen, if that many, pedestrians every day… are these the improvements to Lourensford Road that Mr Pringle mentioned?
He also mentions discussions with Bizweni Road residents on traffic calming. They do not know it, but they are wasting their time with this exercise. We, residents of Gordon Road, have been unsuccessfully involved with Mr Pringle for almost two years on a similar issue.
After the delivery recent municipal elections, in their acceptance speeches, the newly appointed Mayors of Nelson Mandela Bay, Pretoria and elsewhere, mentioned that they were actually the servants of the electorate.
It it quite evident that they were merely disgorging hot air, the true facts of life in these matters are that we are actually all servants of municipal policy and the classification of individual roads, both of which seem to be etched in stone.
I don’t know how old these policies and classifications are… in the case of Gordon Road they are surely outdated and not worth very much. Would it not be possible for the authors of these said policies to meet with residents in order to be appraised of the true state of affairs on the ground, and then possibly to amend the policies?
I might just mention for the benefit of the Bizweni residents that we are not asking for expensive speed bumps, raised pedestrian crossings, or circle.
All that we would like is for the City to paint in a few four-way stops at certain selected intersections along Gordon Road… a lot cheaper option than the pretty sidewalks along Lourensford Road. In his rejoinder Mr Pringle says that “the City is always grateful to residents who take the time to beautify the pavements…” and I conclude with the following: would it not be a more worthwhile excercise for residents of any area to be concerned about the safety of people who have to use the roads in those areas?