A public meeting for Ward 102 members was held in Randburg regarding the social housing project on Selkirk Avenue, a project by the Johannesburg Social Housing Company (Joshco).
The aim of the meeting held on 3 May was for Joshco to consult Ward 102 community members and provide feedback on the development of the Selkirk Avenue housing project. This project is a rental housing development.
Acting executive manager for the development department of Joshco, Cheryl Holmes explained that the development was approved in November of 2010 and it is Joshco’s aim to get people in houses that are closer to their workplaces. She said that it is often a stigma that council houses is not maintained, but according to Holmes they provide services and have a very strict turn-around time in order to complete maintenance on Joshco owned buildings.
She added that they have security services to ensure that only the allowed number of people inhabit the houses. Although the Selkirk Avenue development has already been approved, Joshco proposed two options to the Ward 102 members. Sharif Omarshah, the architect of the development explained the development and said that all the neccessary assessments have already been done.
The development will be on the corner of Jan Smuts Avenue and Selkirk Avenue and will be on a land of 2.3 hectares. Joshco aims to finish 146 units by the end of June 2019 and 375 to 458 units by the end of June 2019 depending on the option that Joshco decides to use. Omarshah explained that option one will have two buildings with three storeys, two with four storeys and one with six storeys.
Members of the community were especially not happy with the second option which includes two, three storey buildings, one, four storey building, a six storey and a ten storey building. The community agreed that noise and the traffic factor could be a real problem as this development would be home to about 2400 people.
Ward 102 Councillor, David Potter attended the meeting along with Ward 104 Councillor, Mike Wood. “For me one of the larger concerns is the size of the current taxi rank. At present it cannot accommodate the demand placed on it and hence the taxis spill over into the residential suburbs of Bordeaux North and all over Randburg CBD,” said Councillor Potter.
He added for this project to be successful, Randburg intends to host the Gautrain and the Rea Vaya Bus Rapid Transit System and that the taxi rank would need to expand in size.
Maki Thellane, stakeholder manager of Joshco said that they aim to provide employment to sub contractors in the area of Randburg so that the community also benefits from the project.
People who were unable top attend the public meeting are welcome to communicate with the social facilitators appointed by Joshco at kgaugelo@ahadev.co.za.
Details: Councillor David Potter, david@oursuburb.co.za
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