Cape Town to proceed with concrete wall on the N2, says Hill-Lewis

Cape Town to proceed with the proposed security wall along the N2 highway that aims to curb crime.

The City of Cape Town will go-ahead with the R114 million "N2 Edge" project to build a nine-kilometer safety and security concrete wall along the N2, DA mayoral candidate Geordin Hill-Lewis said.

“We know what is right for the safety of Capetonians and we will carry on doing whatever is necessary to make Cape Town safer for everyone,” Hill-Lewis said.

He made the comment while responding to questions from the media during the launch of his fourth pledge to the residents of Cape Town on affordable and reliable services in Rocklands, Mitchells Plain.

Hill-Lewis recalled that a 16-year-old boy from Khayelitsha was hit by a vehicle on the N2 and died while in the process of committing crime.

“That is one example, but that happens nearly every week on the N2 and in fact, that road accounts for a staggering number of deaths in our city.”

He also said 70% of all pedestrian deaths in the City happen on the N2. 

“It is a place of carnage for pedestrians and some of those pedestrians are people doing bad things. Unfortunately that incident, of course, we do not wish on anyone and it's a tragedy what happened to that boy.”

However, Hill-Lewis said it should not be easy to get onto a highway and there was currently absolutely no restriction on access to a highway, something that has to be stopped.

He noted that there is already a dilapidated fence that has been there for more than 25 years  that has to be fixed because there was completely unrestricted access to the N2 road. “There is nowhere in the world where you can have unrestricted access to a national road. We have to address that.”

Hill-Lewis added that he had expected the critics of the concrete wall to have called for the repair of that fence line for many years.

“Now when we want to repair the fence line and repair it with something much more robust that people can't break, then all of a sudden people are turning it into a political issue,” he said.

Hill-Lewis, who is campaigning to be re-elected for the second term, said a concrete wall has just been finished on either side of R300 road built by the South African National Road Agency Limited (Sanral).

He added that there was another one being built at Langa.

“When Sanral builds a concrete road, not a word, but when we want to fix an old dilapidated fence to stop access to a national highway and improve it, its a big political issue.

“That should tell you the double standard and the hypocrisy at play here. We completely believe and know that this is the right thing to do for the safety of the residents of Khayelitsha.”

Hill-Lewis stated that feedback from the community indicated the need for the concrete wall and that those complaining about it are either mostly not living in Cape Town and have never had the fear and trepidation of having to drive on the N2 or those living in Cape Town used it as a political stick.

“They are actually coming from bad faith because they are not saying anything about the other government agencies currently building this. They're just trying to make a political issue of it.  We are not going to be intimidated by them,” he added.

Earlier during the launch of his pledge at one of the households, Hill-Lewis said his pledge to Capetonians was to keep essential services reliable and affordable by investing in infrastructure, reducing reliance on Eskom, and keeping municipal costs as low as possible.

“We will continue investing more in essential infrastructure than any other metro, because a growing city needs infrastructure that can keep pace with growth,” he said.

Hill-Lewis noted that the City had quadrupled sewer pipe replacement and doubled fresh-water pipe replacement.

“In the next term, we will replace 100 km of fresh-water pipes and 100 km of sewer pipes every year.”

He also said they had in the last term purchased 200MW of renewal independent power.

“Now we will ramp up our purchases of independent power to 700MW, all of which is cheaper than Eskom power, so that we can pass on these savings to the public,” said the mayor, adding that they will maintain the lowest property rates among South Africa’s metros.