Are the developers of the controversial R300 "Ring Road" toll road proposal reneging on a promise to call off the project if the City of Cape Town opposes it - which it does?
That's the question that specialist environmental attorney Mark Dittke of Zeekoevlei is putting to the developers - the Peninsula Expressway Consortium, called Penway - and to the South African National Roads Agency.
Dittke says Penway project manager Poens Venter gave such an undertaking during a meeting in August 2002 and that his comments were formally minuted.
Last month, the city decided that it did not support the tolling of the proposed R300 Ring Road project, and that it did not want any of this road to be built through the areas of Zeekoevlei, Rondevlei and Zandvlei, much of which fall within the city's proposed False Bay Ecology Park.
But it said it did support the extension and upgrading of the R300 through most of the other sectors of the proposed route, between Bloubergstrand and Retreat. Its detailed comments on the proposed alignment, road network integration and other design criteria had to be addressed first.
On June 25 Dittke sent an email to Venter and to Neil Daly of the roads agency.
He said that, according to the minutes of a meeting on August 26, 2002 which had been called at the request of the project's environmental consultants, he (Dittke) had asked whether the project would be cancelled if the City of Cape Town was opposed to it. The minutes quoted Venter as answering: "Yes, this is correct."
Dittke then said: "There is a tremendous amount of opposition to this proposal within the CCT (city) itself."
Venter answered: "Yes, we have requested that the CCT provide us with a clear statement - one decision is necessary." Dittke then asked: "Would this decision apply to the entire road, or just to the Zeekoevlei area?"
Venter responded: "The entire proposed route."
Dittke's email has now asked Venter whether this minuted undertaking will be honoured. The same day, Venter responded to Dittke: "We acknowledge receipt of your email and will jointly (Penway and Sanral) respond in due course."
After several reminders from Dittke during the next fortnight, Venter sent an email last Friday, saying: "We have received your email and will reply when we are ready."
- Penway and the roads agency have been asked to comment.
- The R300 project's environmental consultants said this week they were busy assimilating issues from comments on the draft environmental impact report.
These would be responded to, with documents in libraries and on the Internet, and the final report was expected by either September or October this year.