Is the city ready for the rush?
Holidaymakers will soon be crowding all the beaches and pools
As the festive season approaches, so too do the holidaymakers. Every December the beaches, a major drawcard for East London, become packed with locals and visitors.
When the Daily Dispatch visited the city’s main beaches earlier this week, the readiness of these tourist destinations delivered a mixed bag. Nahoon Beach, which has had a bout of closures this year due to sewage leaks, was busy and both the beach and its ablutions were clean.
A mixture of families and teenagers, as well as a windsurfer, were taking advantage of the summer weather. The beach’s toilet facilities were, for the most part, in decent shape, with only one missing a seat and appearing to have a slight leak. Bonza Bay beach was also clean with little litter to speak of.
BCM workers were actively working at clearing bushes and generally tidying the area. The beach was very quiet.
Eastern Beach, near popular braai spot Ebuhlanti, was jam-packed. All parking bays were in use with some drivers resorting to parking their vehicles on the kerb. The busy beach was dirtier than its Nahoon alternative, although this may have been due to the considerably larger number of visitors.
However, the Eastern Beach ablution facilities appeared to be far from ready for holidaymakers. The dimly-lit toilets had no artificial lighting, many of the toilets were missing their seats and the floor was very wet.
Orient Beach, just down the road to Eastern Beach, was devoid of beachgoers with only one lone employee walking the grounds. While the grounds were squeaky clean, pools were empty of water when the Daily Dispatch visited on Tuesday.
The controversial Water World near Leaches Bay was closed when the Dispatch visited it, also on Tuesday. Its pools were empty, grass was overgrown and piles of building rubble and precast walling lay inside and outside the park.
Just weeks ago, the Dispatch reported that the park’s toilets were almost entirely stripped of any valuables and that large chunks of retaining wall were missing.
The facilities of Gonubie Beach, once a blue flag beach, appear to be exposed to a mixture of vandalism and a lack of maintenance.
The toilet doors of the men's room had torso-sized holes kicked in them and the floors were wet despite the beach having a total of about seven visitors.
The parking lot was covered in sand and the boardwalk had the occasional railing pole broken or removed.
BCM spokesperson Samkelo Ngwenya, said the city was getting ready for the festive season. “The city will be part of a joint operational centre, together with SAPS, provincial government, social development, provincial safety, provincial transport, and disaster management.
“The city will also put in a total of 72 additional ablution facilities around the beaches,” he said.
He said that an additional 33 lifeguards, supplementing the existing 19, had L been dispatched throughout the city since December 9 “in anticipation of the influx of visitors to its [BCM’s] beaches”.
Ngwenya said that these lifeguards would be on duty until January 31.
“The peak season operational times will be between 7am-6pm at the following beaches: Gonubie beach, Bonza Bay beach, Nahoon beach, Eastern beach, Orient complex and Waterworld complex,” he added.