Houses for Mowbray farm

New residential development set for suburb’s bowling green on historic land site

ADISUSED bowling green in Mowbray, which was once part of the historic Coornhoop farm in the 1600s, is to make way for a 12-unit residential development. The city council has approved the development within the Observatory heritage protection overlay zone subject to a Record of Decision by Heritage Western Cape.

Chairman of the city council’s spatial planning, environment and land use planning committee, Christo Kannenberg, said the council was satisfied that heritage resources would not be affected and that rezoning and subdivision could proceed.

A heritage impact assessment has found that although once part of the Coornhoop werf site, the bowling green is no longer considered subject to formal heritage protection because the larger property was subdivided and sold off in the 1890s.

The Jagger’s Bowling Club was suffering from dwindling membership and there was only enough money for the upkeep of one bowling green, said the submission to the council.

The club, which mostly operates on weekends, would still retain the larger bowling green nearest the clubhouse.

The property proposed for development is 6 947m2 in size and owned by the club’s trustees.

It will be carved up into portions of about 150m2, to make way for individual double-storey dwellings to be known as Strubens Mews.

Councillor Brian Watkyns, who initially raised concerns about the architectural design of the houses, said he was satisfied that it would be in keeping with surrounding properties. Council officials said the individual dwellings would be preferable to a large block of flats.

Despite concerns that the subject site was possibly the site of the historic Coornhoop Fort, a heritage assessment revealed that markings indicated it was more likely to have been a baseball or softball pitch. The bowling club property was part of the land that Governor Jan van Riebeeck granted along the Liesbeek River in 1657 to 14 free burghers for them to farm and supply produce to ships en route to the East.

Fort Coornhoop was built to protect the farmers until it was abandoned. The Coornhoop farm exchanged hands several times, and eventually most of the buildings were demolished because of neglect. The land was subdivided and sold. An MP, John William Jagger, bought the bowling club site in 1920 and established it as a sports ground.

Owing to the construction of the N2 in the 1960s, only the dovecot has survived from the original farm and was proclaimed as a monument in 1966.

Objectors to the proposal raised concerns that the development would not be in keeping with the character of the area and would affect its heritage status.

Several felt the property should remain zoned for community use because of increased densification in the area, the amount of community space would diminish.

But the developer’s consultants said although the land was zoned as such, it had been privately owned for almost 100 years.

The remaining bowling green would continue to lend a visual green space to the neighbourhood.