‘I saw the sign, and it opened up my eyes to our spelling woes!’
Misspelt street names, crescents being turned into avenues and signs pointing in the wrong direction are enough to drive motorists in Nelson Mandela Bay around the bend.
The all too common problem of incorrectly spelt road names plaguing the city has again reared its ugly head in parts of the metro with several new examples highlighted.
In 2015, William Moffett Expressway, one of the Bay’s busiest intersections, became a hot topic for debate when it was incorrectly spelt “Mofet”.
More recently, in Framesby, contractors painting the street signs dropped the second “l” in Murrell Crescent and turned the wording in the second part of the name to Avenue.
The street signs at the intersection of Dorfman Crescent, incorrectly called a street, and Brymore Avenue have, meanwhile, been turned 90 degrees in the wrong direction.
Again in Framesby, Summit Avenue reads correctly as an avenue at one end of the road, but changes to “street” further down.
Norland Crescent in nearby Brymore was repainted to read Norlands Crescent after an “s” was wrongly introduced, and the Karlene Avenue street sign is turned 90 degrees the wrong way onto Kabega Road.
Until December, Alleman Road in Brymore was Willet
Street after the incorrect sign was put up.
Ward councillors said the problem was widespread.
Ward 9 councillor Heinrich Muller said the Wistaria Street sign in Westering was pointed in the wrong direction, while Redwing Road was incorrectly labelled a street.
A debate is also raging over the correct spelling of two other Westering streets, with questions about the “s” in Papenkuils instead of Papenkuil and whether an extra “f” should be added to Boshof to read as Boshoff.
Meanwhile, Muller has lamented the unsightly occurrence.
“I’ve had it in the Westering side as well,” he said.
“It has also happened that either a road has been turned into a crescent or a crescent into a street.
“I know the signs were so faded residents could hardly read them, but there’s no excuse for the incorrect spellings.
“The municipality must give [the contractor] a list with the correct names.
“It might seem minor but people are getting paid to do the job, yet they aren’t doing it correctly.”
Muller said the poor workmanship gave credence to residents’ gripes over the shoddy quality of the usual service delivery items.
“It’s something that spills over from the quality of the work that we get back in respect of normal service delivery issues,” he said.
“Naturally, residents are upset, having struggled for long to have something done, yet there’s no oversight from officials to check whether the correct work was done.”
Residents criticised the municipality for hiring “incompetent” contractors.
Clive Hassell, who lives in Framesby Gardens, bordering Brymore, said: “Residents are taking the pi** out of the contractors for being ignorant.
“They are laughing and saying it is typical of the municipality to hire someone who can’t read and then paying them to do the job.”
Another resident, Werner Botha, applauded the effort to redo the street signs after a long time but criticised the incompetency.
This, he said, would pose an inconvenience to outsiders unless addressed urgently.
“It’s one thing for people residing there to know the difference but visitors and couriers, or anyone looking for a specific address, will end up at the wrong place,” Botha said.
Ward 39 councillor Margaret de Andrade said her office had brought the issue, which she called inexcusable, to the municipality’s attention.
“Should a resident need an ambulance or the police, the misspelling becomes an issue.”
Municipal spokesperson Mamela Ndamase requested an extension to today to respond.