Retaining wall collapses … again

A RETAINING wall that collapsed in Havelock Crescent, Morningside last week, forced the closure of the road while workers cleared the scene.

Councillor Martin Meyer spent hours directing traffic on the road after the wall collapsed. Meyer said this was the third time in three months that the wall had come tumbling down.

He said the retaining wall collapsed at around 3pm on Thursday, strewing blocks across the road. He got to the scene at 4pm, and had to stop cars from going near the site, as a section of the road had been closed to traffic.

“I stood directing cars until 8pm and then had to leave,” he said, adding that he was concerned that if a motorists had hit one of the blocks at 60km/h, it could have had disastrous consequences. Meyer said an added frustration was that the street lights in the road had not been working for the past work, making the area extremely dark.”The workers cleared half the road and then erected danger tape across the section of road on both sides of the site to stop cars from passing through, however one driver drove straight through the tape, and carried on going! I am also shocked that danger tape was only put up, there was no signage warning motorists, and cars speed up this road. I did report this to Metro Police, but am not sure if they attended the scene,” said Meyer.

He said he had reported the wall to building inspectors when it first collapsed on 2 August. Meyer said he felt the wall was too high and too vertical. “The building inspector, however, never replied to my email,” he said.

“Retaining walls should be built at an angle. I am worried about the fact that this wall is being built vertically. There is no cement in these walls, they are just interlinking blocks. This is the third time this wall has collapsed, and it randomly fell, there was no rain on Thursday. Something needs to be done about it. I question how the plan for this wall was even passed,” he said.

Meyer’s concern was that the wall was just going to be rebuilt and felt it could collapse again.

“Residents from the old age home in the road walk past here all the time, what if the wall falls on a resident?” he said.

A resident who contacted Berea Mail regarding the collapsed wall also said she was worried someone would be hurt if the wall collapsed again.