Major burst pipes in Forest Town, Saxonwold, Parktown and more suburbs cause water outages
Frequent water outages in the Northern Johannesburg suburb have become the norm.
Within the past few weeks, suburbs in Johannesburg North have reported water outages almost every day. One of the instances was on June 18 when resident Liesl Lategan posted on the community’s Facebook page that they had no water, yet again!
Lategan further enquired, “Why are we paying rates and taxes then? I think each household should be exempt. And we should take that money ourselves and get the pipes replaced and potholes fixed? Why are we expected to just continue to sit back and pay, pay, pay for an infrastructure that has failed due to corruption and mismanagement? I think we should pay for what we get.”
Ward 117 councillor Tim Truluck responded to the post and said that Saxonwold, Forest Town and Melrose have new pipes. He further explained, “The problem is the other suburbs don’t – so a burst anywhere in the other suburbs means you have no water till it’s fixed. But there is no budget anymore and I see nothing on the horizon.”
He said even if there was a budget, and assuming a suburb gets done every two years, one would be looking at about 16-plus years. “The pipes are rotten and not coping now and it will get worse. Throw in the densification going on – the Parktown reservoir will probably not be able to cope with increased demand as Rand Water cannot supply the current reservoirs.
“So, the scenario is not good. Much like we are all getting solar/batteries/inverters, I would think the next thing on the list is jojos for each household,” Truluck stated.
Johannesburg Water was contacted on June 20 and spokesperson Nolwazi Dhlamini responded on June 29 to say the suburbs in Region B; Forest Town and Parkview and Region E; Saxonwold, Parktown, Parkwood, and Parkhurst were facing water outages because of the frequent major burst pipes that occur in these areas. The burst pipes are caused by the ageing of the infrastructure.
Johannesburg Water said they have a programme in place to address the ongoing water pipe bursts across the city. The entity has a pipe replacement programme which aims to reduce the burst frequencies and minimise water losses Dhlamini said.
“For the current financial year, which runs from July 1 2022 to June 30 2023, Johannesburg Water budgeted R69 622 million for the pipe replacement programme. For the next financial year, which runs from July 1 2023 to June 30 2024, Johannesburg Water has budgeted R105 million for the replacement of water pipes,” Dhlamini revealed.
She said since the commencement of the pipe replacement programme, 452km of piping (water and sewer) have been replaced. For the next financial year, Johannesburg Water plans on replacing 31km of water piping according to Dhlamini.
Related articles:
Parkhurst and Houghton have experienced burst pipes within the same month
