Residents cry foul over Point Development open day

INTERESTED individuals and parties affected by the proposed Point Development were disappointed that Saturday’s open day did not give them an opportunity to raise and discuss their concerns, but described it rather as a PR exercise on behalf of the developers and eThekwini Municipality.

The deputy city manager for economic Development and Planning at eThekwini, Musa Mbhele said a public meeting would only allow grand standing. “We thought the open day would be most productive and welcomed the water sport clubs, real estate and residents because we have nothing to hide and are fully transparent. We didn’t want to have the public meeting because that would give way for grandstanding and not everyone would have a chance to air their views,” he said. However, he later agreed that a public meeting was what the community desired.

Cameron Nair, a local businessman, whose family has an apartment within the Point development area said he felt the whole set up of the public participation was a farce. “I’m sure it would go ahead, without a hitch, there’s R15 to 20 million in planning so I believe objections are just a phase that they have to get through because there’s too much money involved and all our minor objections won’t really stop anything!”

“The presentation was shoddy, the people couldn’t answer direct questions we had asked. Simple things like how tall is the building, I had three different answers, 13, 15 and 22 storeys. There were no objection forms, just query forms, so if every person wrote out concerns they are not going to be sited as legitimate objections, I feel we were hoodwinked.”

“After an hour and a half trying to get answers, the only clarity I got was when I spoke to the developer directly, everyone else was utterly useless. It was more of a PR exercise,” he added.

Project manager and head of Operations South Africa for Renong/UEM Sunrise, Soban Bevarah, in answering concerns about beach shadows said the development was designed with an ‘S’ shape to minimise the shadow on the beach. “There are also big gaps to bring in sunlight. The shadows and views were taken into consideration with at least 80 per cent of the views unaffected.” he added.

According to Karin Solomon from Save Our Sunshine Durban the public will no longer be pacified by shallow displays of what the Point development would look like on the day as too many had been burnt by previous false promises and were sitting with the results of their former naivety. “I spoke to many people currently living in apartments at the Point who had lost millions due to the investment they had made there, and now stand to lose even more. One gentleman said he was sitting with an apartment he can’t give away and foresees all the existing apartment buildings becoming low-cost housing soon,” she said.

“Of specific interest to me is the ‘under the promenade’ issue. I asked several people at the open day where the watersports clubs would be accommodated in the new development, and the answer was simply ‘under the promenade’. No further details were available,” she said.

Johnny Vassilaros from Save Vetch’s Association said: “From Save Vetch’s Association prespective, we cannot object to this development. Our fundamental goals were to save Vetch’s Beach and Vetch’s Pier – that has been achieved. We have always said that we have no objection to any development above the erosion line. From the perspective of the Durban Paddle Ski Club, the only comment we saw was that the clubs will be accommodated beneath the promenade. We do not know any other details and that is a concern.”

Objections to the rezoning of the land to allow the development to go ahead close on 31 July. A public meeting to discuss the Point Development further will be held at the Botanic Gardens next Friday, 31 July from 6pm to 8pm.

Download the Developer’s response forms by going to Saveoursunshinedurban.co.za – Public Participation Process – Download Rezoning Response Forms, and submit them by 31 July. People are urged to also send the forms to info@saveoursunshinedurban.co.za, so that their concerns can be added to the List Of Issues To Be Addressed, which appears on the website saveoursunshinedurban.co.za