Building on main water pipe line poses a danger to community

The Ministry of Human Settlement Water and Sanitation under the stewardship of Minister Lindiwe Sisulu is extremely concerned about the mushrooming of illegal and legal settlement constructed on or near main water servitudes across the country.

The ageing infrastructure, leaking and the frequent pipe bursts in most parts of the country is of a great concern to the Ministry.

The Department, together with water service providers, has embarked on the refurbishment of main water pipeline infrastructure and the replacement of old pipes with new ones, to meet the growing population demand. This is a  joint exercise between Department of Water and Sanitation (DWS) with  the local municipalities and waterboards.

“Culprits that encroach on water servitudes are running the risk of losing their lives in the event of a pipe bursts,” DWS said

Building a house on top of major water supply pipeline is hazardous to the community.

Such malpractices must be addressed at early detection by, either fining the culprits by water service provider concerned or the responsible water-board.

Currently, in South Africa our water gets channeled by using high caliber pipelines ranging from 600mm to 900mm with hydraulic pressure rating (PN) 250 bar. In this kind of pressure mount, should there be a hole in the pipe water will gash out to approximately 20 meters in the air.

That clearly demonstrate the danger of encroaching on water servitudes.

Because South Africa is one of  the driest and water scaresd countries in the world, it is our obligation to attend to any water loss urgently as and when it happen, according to the DWS

It becomes a challenge when the main pipeline has to be fixed but access denied. Due to settlements that are  built on structures making it difficult for engineers to access the pipes for maintenance and inspections purpose.

“This kind of inappropriate behavior puts the lives of the innocent in danger should the pressure in the pipe cause pipe-burst. Local municipalities are also urged to play a leading role in overseeing illegal settlement structures on servitudes.’