Hoping for a solution

THE owners of BP Moore Road, along with the Bulwer Community Safety Forum and police, are hoping to find a way forward regarding the continued issue of noise disturbance at the station.

At a recent meeting of the Bulwer Community Safety Forum, chairperson, Heather Rorick, reported back to residents that Metro Police had been working on addressing the issue of noise disturbance as a result of youngsters parking their cars at the petrol station in the evenings and on the weekends, while pumping music from their cars, drinking out of their boots and shouting over the music to each other.

“Since the owners have put up signs warning motorists against this, there has been an improvement. It is still humming on the weekends, but there are not as many taxis parking off at the station. Our concern is that these people leave the station and then go into the community, driving under the influence, and then party in the road, such as at the intersection of Umbilo and Che Guevara Roads,” she said.

At the meeting, Metro Police's Capt Neville Govender said Metro would be undertaking ongoing operations and had vans in the area to deal with the problem.

“We are trying to minimise the problem and the noise. We are dealing with it, but there are different cars coming in all the time. If we inconvenience them enough, we hope they will move on,” he said.

At a meeting between the owners, Graeme and Zelda Schewitz, Rorick and Berea Mail on Tuesday, Rorick said she felt a meeting with SAPS, Metro Police, the Bulwer Community Safety Forum and the owners needed to be organised so they could work together on this problem.

Graeme said he had erected signs, but there needed to be a working relationship and the police needed to be committed to lowering the noise pollution.

“It needs to be consistent and managed, and needs to be a consistently-implemented system. Our ultimate goal is to keep the noise down. We will never be rid of the noise factor in a student area. I feel this is a symptom, and the root cause is the police are allowing it to happen. We need the police on site to speak to the offenders as a deterrent. We need enforcement, and also a buy-in by the offenders to ask them to lower the levels; they know they are doing the wrong thing,” he said.

He said he felt a compromise was needed for them to be able to keep their 'garage culture' but to be there and play music at an acceptable level.

“We need a plan of action, and hope the different parties can work together on this to come up with a solution,” said Rorick.