Dan Plato
CAPE TOWN - In April the City approved the construction of a large private development on the River Club site in Observatory.
The development will replace the existing parking lot and golf course with a mixed-use precinct featuring public open space, housing, offices and retail space, a school, restaurants and events facilities.
In addition, surrounding environmental resources (such as the Liesbeek River) will be transformed.
The Observatory Civic Association has taken the City’s approval on review, and has sought to stop the development from going ahead while the review is determined.
On September 28 the association’s chairperson, Leslie London, made certain claims about the approval and the development in this newspaper.
It is a good thing for important decisions and developments to be the subject of public debate.
That debate should be guided by a commitment to the truth and honesty.
London’s attack is sadly lacking in this regard.
First there are the economic considerations.
The development will create more than 5 200 construction jobs and about 13 700 employment opportunities for sub-contractors and supporting businesses.
This is over and above 860 post-construction jobs.
The job creation will be supported by a range of other contributions.
About R4.5 billion will be directly invested by the developer, which will boost Cape Town’s economy by an estimated R8.5bn over three – five years as the effects of the investment multiply through local sectors.
The developer will erect about R85m in road and bridge infrastructure that will serve the general public by linking the Voortrekker Road corridor to Liesbeek Parkway.
This will provide a critical connection between eastern and western portions of the City, reducing travelling times and improving access to various economic opportunities and lifestyle amenities.
London may scoff at these benefits.
The City and its residents do not: at a time when Cape Town and the world economy have been hard hit by the Covid-19 pandemic and the associated lockdowns, these opportunities are an essential component of the City’s recovery.
London says that it is shameless to claim that his conduct will lead to job losses.
But he wants to put a stop to the development at all costs.
That means that thousands of employment opportunities and billions of rand in investment will all be lost.
Where will the jobs come from if the development is halted? Who will provide the capital? Certainly not London.
Second, there are the heritage considerations.
There is no doubt that the site has a rich history, especially for the first nations and the country’s history of resistance to colonialism.
However, this was completely ignored by the site’s previous use as a parking lot and an exclusive set of golfing greens.
When I conducted a site inspection, I was struck by the fact that any visitor to the River Club would be completely ignorant of the site’s historical significance.
London wants to preserve the parking area and golf club.
How that respects and promotes heritage remains a mystery to me.
More importantly, the First Nations Collective has developed a different vision for the site – a vision that is informed by authentic indigenous voices and celebrates the site’s heritage rather than allowing it to remain covered in tar and lawns.
Through input from the First Nations Collective, the development proposal has been reformulated to include a memory centre that will allow the first nations’ heritage to be recorded and transmitted to current and future generations; an indigenous garden and amphitheatre, which will allow the intangible aspects of heritage such as medicinal knowledge and cultural performances to be celebrated; and a heritage eco-trail, which will align with the first nations’ respect for the site’s ecology.
It should be noted that neither the South African Heritage Resources Agency nor Heritage Western Cape has supported London’s attempt to stop the development.
It is not apparent why London thinks he is empowered to overrule the First Nations Collective on matters of indigenous heritage.
Then there is the matter of sustainable development. London claims that there are ‘many other sites’ that could be developed.
I can confirm that there are few sites in the City that are so centrally located and offer comparable opportunities for economic development, transport infrastructure, ecological rehabilitation, heritage promotion and integrated housing.
There are even fewer private developers who are willing to utilise their own capital and resources to make these opportunities available to Cape Town.
Sustainable development is the City’s path to prosperity, yet London makes no mention of it.
The Liesbeek River currently flows through a degraded and polluted concrete canal.
The City has imposed conditions of approval requiring the developer to remove the concrete and establish a river course that will provide a natural environment for local fauna and flora, thereby heightening the site’s ecological functionality.
The developer will also be required to dedicate at least 49 000m2 to special open space, which must be landscaped to provide high-quality green spaces to be enjoyed by the public.
The development proposal is supported by numerous environmental studies by independent experts, none of which has been countered by any similar input from London (or any other objector).
The developer proposed including thousands of square metres of residential accommodation, which will assist in addressing the demand for well-located dwelling units.
The City imposed conditions of approval to ensure that at least 20% of the residential offering is set aside as affordable housing for low-income households.
If London is successful in interdicting the development, none of this affordable housing will be provided.
The City’s decisions were preceded by two comprehensive public-participation processes.
London and other interested and affected parties made extensive use of those processes, as was their entitlement.
All of that input was given detailed consideration by the City’s officials, Municipal Planning Tribunal and myself.
The development has been leveraged by the City to provide a range of public goods, including the construction of transport infrastructure that has been sorely needed but unaffordable for years, a rehabilitated river corridor, a new and integrated neighbourhood and the establishment of various facilities that will allow the heritage of the first nations to be respected and celebrated.
Furthermore, the development will transform the site from an isolated and exclusive golf club to a modern and accessible mixed-use precinct with job-sustaining commercial uses and well-located residential opportunities.
This demonstrates how the public sector, the private sector and local residents can work in partnership to ensure genuine sustainable development.
London wishes to prevent all of these benefits from manifesting, in order to preserve a golf course and a parking area.
That shows an extremely distorted set of priorities, and would be manifestly harmful to the public interest and the residents of Cape Town.
Plato is Cape Town executive mayor
Cape Times