Paving the way forward

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.

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

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

– such as gravel base layer repairs, surface layer rejuvenation and resealing activities – within its allocated budget. This alignment has enabled the municipality to address all the challenges associated with the poor availability of maintenance plant and machinery.

Achievements

The many challenges aside, Emfuleni has managed to achieve a number of milestones during the 2018/19 financial year pertaining to its roads and stormwater activities.

These achievements include: the resealing of 14.12 km or road; the patching of over 7 220 m2 of potholes: the cleaning of 788 stormwater catch pits, 1 270 m of concrete channels, 409 m of stormwater concrete pipes, and 1 108.3 m of gravel channels; the maintenance of 6 537.6 m2 of road markings and 199.04 km of gravel roads; and the replacement of 326 road traffic signs. Further achievements by the Roads and Stormwater Department are: • Patching of potholes, rehabilitation and resealing of tarred roads – provided daily sustainable tar road maintenance to 1 665 km of tarred roads. • Re-gravelling, grading and rip and recompacting of gravel roads – provided a daily sustainable gravel road maintenance to 1 054 km of gravel roads. • Erection of road traffic signs and street name boards – provided daily sustainable road sign maintenance of 14 602 in number. • Road markings – provided daily sustainable road markings maintenance to an area of 158 445 m2 . • Cleaning of verges and gutters – provided daily sustainable road cleaning maintenance to all tarred roads. • Cleaning of stormwater pipes, lined, unlined channels and catch pits – provided daily sustainable stormwater system maintenance to some 12 270 catch pits, 213 km of channels and 530 km of pipes.

LESEDI

At present, Lesedi Local Municipality has about 652 km of road, of which 385 km is surfaced and 267 km gravel. Currently, the rate of backlog reduction is around 5 km to 10 km per year. Taking into account that the lifespan of a surfaced road is around 75 years, surfaced roads need to be resealed around four or five times over their lifespan, depending on usage levels.

The two major arterial routes running through Lesedi are the N3 and the N17 national route. The N17 runs from Johannesburg to the Swaziland border, while the N3 is the country’s logistical lifeline – running from Johannesburg to the Port of Durban. Both of these heavily trafficked roadways are maintained by the South African National Roads Agency Limited.

The types of seals utilised in Lesedi are tar surface and paving; no foreign resources are needed in maintaining the paving. In general, paved roads need less maintenance during their service period, while gravel roads need to be graded regularly to be kept in a trafficable condition. This certainly places some strain on the available resources.

Backlog

The total backlog for roads and stormwater for RDP houses in the Lesedi area stands at around 26 km. The backlog on roads and stormwater and the resealing of roads is 117.5 km. The total funding required to accomplish this project is some R450 million.

There is a need to upgrade a section of the R42 road between Heidelberg and Nigel due to the major developments in the Heidelberg zone of opportunity and Jameson Park. The R549 route between Heidelberg and Ratanda is also in need of upgrading due to the extension of the Obed Mthombeni Nkosi township and the construction of related mixed-use developments. The biggest challenge remains in the Agricultural Holdings region, where – due to the distance, low occupation density and sparseness of the area – it is very expensive to develop road infrastructure. The Agricultural Holdings roads are largely gravel, and are maintained by the municipality.

Active projects

An amount of R15 million has been jointly budgeted by the Department of Rural Development and Land Reform (R12 million) and Lesedi Local Municipality (R3 million) to develop roads in Impumelelo. The municipality has further allocated the following budgets to various roads and stormwater projects for the 2020/21 financial year: • KwaZenzele Phase 1 roads and stormwater – R6 million • Ratanda 1, 2, 3 and Obed Nkosi roads and stormwater – R7 million • Jamesonpark roads and stormwater – R3 million • Heidelberg Ext 23/26 roads and Stormwater – R4 million • Ratanda Ext 7 roads and stormwater – R2 million. For the 2021/22 financial year, Lesedi has allocated a budget of R6 million for the repair and resealing of roads, while R7 million is the projected budget for 2022/23.

MIDVAAL

The road network in Midvaal Local Municipality mainly caters for north-south movement through the area due to the historic functional relationship between Johannesburg to the north and VereenigingVanderbijlpark to the south.

The following are routes of national and/ or provincial and local significance in and around the Midvaal area: • The R59 links Vereeniging with Alberton and the N12 in Johannesburg. This route

is situated in the central part of Midvaal

Local Municipality area and has been marketed as a development/industrial corridor since the late 1990s. • The N1 is the major national north-south route linking Musina in the north to Cape

Town in the south, and passes adjacent to the west of the Midvaal area. • The N3 is the major transport link between Gauteng province and eThekwini, and passes the Midvaal area a few kilometres to the north-east. • The R82 is a secondary north-south route linking Vereeniging and Johannesburg via Walkerville and De Deur, situated in the western parts of Midvaal. The route runs parallel to and midway between the

N1 and the R59 freeways and attracts mixed-use development around De Deur, Walkerville and Tedderfield. Gautrans is in the process of incrementally upgrading route R82 from north to south and the section from Johannesburg up to just past

Walkerville has been completed. • The M61 is a secondary north-south route running parallel to the west of the

R59 linking Vereeniging and Alberton via

Meyerton, Randvaal and Waterval.

• The R42 runs east-west through Midvaal and links Meyerton to Heidelberg and the

N17 in Lesedi Local Municipality. • The R551 is an east-west route between the N1 and the Suikerbosrand Nature

Reserve. This road merges with route R42 at the Nature Reserve. • The R557 is an east-west link between the N3, R59 and R82 in Midvaal, linking

Waterval and Walkerville to the N3. • The R54 links Vaal Marina to Meyerton and the R82 further to the west. • The R549 functions as the Heidelberg-

Vaal/Marina-Potchefstroom connector.

Road conditions

The condition of provincial roads in Midvaal is generally poor and the routes require upgrading, as identified in the IDP. Excessive freight transport (and overloading) and a lack of maintenance are contributing to the deterioration of provincial road infrastructure.

Stormwater is primarily drained via surface drains and channels that are cleaned annually. Stormwater run-off is a particular problem in the rural areas where roads are not properly constructed or maintained. During heavy rains, damage is caused to roads by stormwater, rendering the roads unusable and requiring frequent maintenance and repair.

Public transport

The public transport system in Midvaal is as efficient as it can be at present to deliver a reliable service to all communities. Private transport seems to be the norm in the urban parts of the area, while public transport is more commonly used in the rural areas. The R82 is a major public transport corridor.

Taxis are the most dominant form of public transportation, followed by buses. The low levels of private vehicle ownership correspond with the low income levels in the disadvantaged communities. This emphasises the need for public transport routes and facilities in the Midvaal municipal area. The very low population densities in the rural areas are, however, not conducive to effective public transport.