Even the mention of the words ‘South Road’ will warrant an exaggerated eyeroll from anyone who was once a regular user of the road.
It has been nearly four years since South Road was closed due to a sinkhole compromising the road’s integrity, and it seems that for every update on the progress there is another reason that the completion of the bridge has been delayed.
Several setbacks have been encountered since the road was initially closed off and barricaded with large boulders in October 2017. After a hoard of behind the scenes planning and authorisations, the construction officially began in June 2019 with an expected turnaround time of one year. Since then, there has been one postponement after another, with the last published completion date being February 2021.
As we near the end of the month, Ward 71 councillor, René Benjamin has assisted with an update on whether motorists can expect to use the road again any time soon. In short, the answer is no.
“The construction, repair and rehabilitation of the South Road Bridge have had a number of setbacks and delays, the recent of which saw the replacement of the project engineer,” said the councillor.
Other delays came from the national lockdown and a struggle to attain materials due to industries that supplied the site being either closed or struggling to get stock, especially steel. Reinforcement steel is reportedly still in short supply as the steel industry was hit hard by the lockdown. According to René, the new completion date for South Road is 29 April. The reasoning behind this has been put down to not only the low availability of steel, but also challenges with the weather as the team cannot work in heavy rain.
According to the councillor, the project is at 87 per cent completion. Work that still needs to be done involves cutting off the walls, working on the columns, head walls, approach slab and deck slab, as well as the road works, ancillary work and site rehabilitation.
