Quicker housing solution

The pressure cooker of pent-up demand for urban housing has been much in the news of late. Gauteng announced recently that more site and service opportunities will be rolled out to relieve this logjam, a policy endorsed by President Cyril Ramaphosa for national adoption. While this is a step in the right direction, it can be altered to allow much faster implementation.

The stated policy in Gauteng is for the government to provide full services (water, sewerage, electricity, roads, storm-water) before opening a new township for settlement. The new policy will allow for own-build of top structures, but only from approved plans or department-approved deviations to these plans. This process will still be slow, often unaffordable, and will not provide much relief.

A more pragmatic approach would be for the government to initially provide only basic services — these being layout, graded roads and rudimentary drainage, a piped water standpipe per stand, and a toilet. The new owners should then be allowed to build what they can at their own pace. If this is initially only one room or a shack, so be it. In time further building will follow, and the township will develop a diverse, livable feel, as opposed to the soul-destroying monochrome “one size fits all” of many low-cost housing developments. Full services can be retrofitted later as and when the government has the budget – a process that takes time and capital.

In these matters, we really have to grow up and face reality.

Anthony Still Waverley

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