Councillor demands urgency from roads agency

His message was simple, he wanted urgency from the Johannesburg Roads Agency with regards to the reconstruction.

“I have reports that contractors for the roads agency are not paid on time and some [have been] waiting longer than 90 days to get paid,” he said.

He told the meeting that maybe that is the reason why the contractors are not on site because of the City’s tendering process in which certain contractors are given multiple contracts.

“Maybe because of capacity constraints these same contractors can only work on one contract at a time,” added Earp.

“This, surely if true, is an indictment of the City’s tendering process where multiple contracts are awarded to a single contractor who may not have the capacity, the manpower and ability to complete the contracts on time.”

Earp discussed the series of excuses given by the roads agency during a public meeting in Bryanston as to why the project to reconstruct the Coleraine Drive bridge had been at such a slow pace.

“Neotel cables had to be lifted, a sewerage pipe and a water pipe was damaged by the contractors’ staff during excavation,” said Earp. “Telkom took three weeks to lift their cables.”

Earp also explained that due the soil conditions under the collapsed culvert, the roads agency decided not to repair the culvert but to build a bridge.

“The initial cost of repairs was R4,93 million and this has now escalated to the present contract price of R13,7 million,” said Earp. “If our [earlier] calls for intervention had been taken seriously, the estimated costs of repair would never have been this high.”

Earp said residents were angry and demand action, accountability and close monitoring of the project.

Do you have faith that the roads agency will complete the reconstruction of Coleraine Drive before the end of 2014? Tweet your comment to @Sandton_News #ColeraineDrive