ROADS
A nation’s roads are the arteries that feed its economic heartbeat, which makes their maintenance, upgrading and construction vital functions of local, provincial and national authorities.
Paving the way forward EMFULENI Within Emfuleni Local Municipality, it is the mandate of the Roads and Stormwater Department to ensure the safety of motorists and general road users in the municipal area. This should be achieved through the regular maintenance of the local roads and stormwater network throughout the entire municipality. Emfuleni’s municipal area contains 1 600 km of tarred road and 1 054 km of gravel road surfaces, which is more than the municipality itself can afford to adequately maintain. In fact, a total of R343 million is required in the municipality to address the urgent resurfacing maintenance needs of tarred roads. Fortunately, an intervention from the Gauteng Department of Roads and Transport, through
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REBIRTH OF THE VAAL
a programme of patching potholes and retarring local roads, has given Emfuleni’s Roads and Stormwater Department much needed relief, as the shortage of resources has been a major challenge in this regard. The continued maintenance of local roads and stormwater systems has now at least become a regular feature. This is all thanks to the usage of hired plant and machinery. Taking into account the current size of
the workforce available, which has about 79% in vacant positions, the municipality is looking at recruiting trained personnel and even at expediting the process of acquiring the training and skills development programmes for existing persons. Emfuleni Local Municipality has managed to align both its road maintenance programmes and rehabilitation programmes
