Taking back North End
Plan mooted to revitalise once-vibrant business precinct to prevent it from becoming a ghost town
Besieged by crime, collapsing infrastructure and a general state of decay that is chasing big businesses out of the area, residents and business owners in North End are fighting back.
A plan to revitalise the inner city was discussed at a meeting between some of Nelson Mandela Bay’s political bosses, Ward 5 councillor Terri Stander (DA), residents and members of the North End business cluster yesterday.
The aim is to turn around the general neglect and prevent the area from becoming a ghost town.
What was once a vibrant trade area bustling with second-hand dealers, North End is now characterised by decaying buildings, “illegal” scrapyards and broken down cars lining the side streets.
North End business cluster chair and businessman James Flanagan said crime and vandalism of properties had resulted in big business owners who could afford to rent elsewhere leaving the area — which was detrimental to the initiative they were working on to sustain trade in the area.
“This is an area where the rate per square metre for rental is a lot cheaper than other areas in the city,” Flanagan said.
“What we have found is that businesses that can afford it leave for other areas because of the infrastructure challenges, safety concerns and the general filth. Those are the businesses with the big money that we need to make a contribution towards this initiative to turn around and make a change in North End.
“Businesses that have remained are generally ones that can’t afford the additional contribution because they’re already struggling to keep their heads above water.”
Flanagan said the business cluster had started an initiative to clean up, paint road markings and replace collapsing stormwater culverts.
“We’ve come together to assist in fixing some of the broken infrastructure, look at ways to prevent vandalism of municipal and privately owned properties, improve safety and security, but, most importantly, to retain the existing businesses in the North End geographical cluster and hopefully attract more businesses.”
He said the business cluster had come up with a constitution as the basis of its application to the SA Revenue Service to be registered as a public benefit organisation from a tax perspective.
“Our next immediate objective is to collate a register of all businesses which can voluntarily afford to contribute funds to take up some of the issues experienced in the area.”
Other challenges included criminals living in derelict and hijacked buildings, an influx of vagrants foraging for food and valuables in rubbish bags and
leaving the litter lying around, broken street lights caused by vandalism and contributing to crime in the dark, and holes and trenches that were not covered and had caused accidents.
Addressing the cluster, Nelson Mandela Bay mayor Retief Odendaal attributed the majority of issues experienced by the business owners to a systematic breakdown.
“It has not been easy to do business in Nelson Mandela Bay for the past couple of years and taking on this additional responsibility as businesses is remarkable,” he said.
“We need to apologise for the state that North End finds itself in.
“We all know that this area for many decades was our business precinct but over the years we’ve neglected it and as a result of ailing infrastructure and increasing criminal activity, we’ve seen an exodus of business from this area.”
Odendaal committed to look into interventions related to infrastructure refurbishment, which would take a while to be implemented due to the division of resources to other areas that were also experiencing a collapse of infrastructure.
Mount Road police station captain Werner Meyer said the crime pattern analysis for North End for the last quarter of the past financial year showed a surge in robberies, theft out of motor vehicles and drugs.
“North End is one of the major crime hotspots managed by the Mount Road policing area [and] whenever we have operations we always start here.
“People still tend to leave their valuables visible in cars, which get broken into all the time.”
Meyer said the police had since established a sector crime forum for North End where they would be working with community members to assist with awareness campaigns and crime operations.
“We’ve also noticed a big increase in student accommodation here, which contributes to robberies and we are busy with awareness campaigns to help keep them [students] safe,” he said.
Stander, who has been driving the eviction of illegal occupants in abandoned and hijacked buildings in the ward, said thieves were stealing CCTV cameras mounted on business properties meant for the surveillance of criminals and solar panels installed to avert the effects of loadshedding.
“Some have resorted to putting cages around their solar panels but I have seen a video of a man stealing the cage and the panel,” she said.
“I’ve been working closely with the business people here and some own a number of properties with tenants.
“However, the tenants are leaving and the owners can’t sell the buildings because noone will buy them due to the decreased value of the property and safety concerns.”
Stander said the illegal settlements created by vagrants under the bridges of Russell, Albany, Mount and Darling roads added to the problems in the cluster and social services needed to be roped in for alternative accommodation for them.
“Intimidation by car guards who are not PSIRA-accredited is another problem because most times they double as scouts for criminals,” she said.