David Ritchie

Work has started on the controversial toll plaza on Chapmans Peak Drive, despite continued protests and objections by some groups and residents. Photo: David Ritchie

An Inkatha Freedom Party MP wants Western Cape premier Helen Zille to reconsider her stance on the building of a toll plaza at Chapman's Peak.

Mario Oriani-Ambrosini, a Hout Bay resident, said any future plans for the route had to take into account the needs of those who used the road for daily commuting.

“The recent history of Chapman's Peak Drive is a string of errors, the compound effect of which is now forcing the present course of events.

“Instead of committing to one more error... we must step back and take a hard look at the entire situation to ensure that this national monument and treasure is going to be available to us all for many generations to come.”

Oriani-Ambrosini said many of the interventions made on Champan's Peak to prevent the harm caused by falling rocks had proved to be “huge and expensive mistakes” that had to be repeated, corrected and improved time and again.

The terms under which the privatisation of the road had taken place had also been a mistake, he said.

“The management of the road is a mistake which results in daily inefficiency and outrageous tolls paid by local commuters and tourists alike.

“We should go back and rectify all these mistakes rather than being forced into new and bigger mistakes, because we are trapped by past mistakes.”

Oriani-Ambrosini, who is of Italian ancestry, said Champan's Peak Road was particularly dear to him because it was in his own backyard and had been built with “the blood and sweat of so many Italian prisoners of war”. - Sapa