Wasted water also causing road damage in Wilsonia

Business owners say they’ve reported issue but no action taken

Water that has been leaking for the past seven months in the Wilsonia industrial area is putting strain on the road surface in the area.

Clean water has been pouring onto Bert Kipling Road, creating huge potholes in the road situated in the industrial area.

Local businesses claim they had reported the leakages since late last year, but nothing had been done to date.

The water appears to be leaking from the nearby Dawn water reservoir, and has been flowing through the veld onto the road, where a dam of water has collected.

Richard McMillan, of Amalgamated Precast which is closest to the leakage, said staff first noticed the problem late last year.

“We had a leakage on our water meter and we called a plumber, but they said that they couldn’t fix it because it was leaking on the municipality’s side.

“It took three months before they came to fix that problem and now there’s this. It’s been over seven months already.”

McMillan said he had called the municipality’s water department to complain, and also lodged several complaints through the new Buffalo City Metro (BCM) app designed to register such complaints.

“The new app was useless. Every time I lodged a complaint, I just got a new reference number all the time, but there was no follow-up. Because we work with concrete, the leakage has had an affect on our factory because water is easily absorbed by concrete.

“This is why Buffalo City Metro’s tariffs are higher than most municipalities and their rate bills are exorbitant because they try to compensate for losses like these,” he said.

Mandy Benn, of Eagle Trans, said while their business was not affected by the water leakage, their vehicles were affected by the massive potholes.

“I would be surprised if it’s the water towers that are leaking again because early last year they were fixed when the water was flooding severely from there onto the road.

“That was a big job which you’d expect to have lasted for more than a year.

“This time it’s not as bad, but still a lot of clean water is going to waste. With all the water gushing through the road, the tar has withered away more in some parts and there are big holes which can do damage to our wheels.”

BCM spokesperson Samkelo Ngwenya said if the reports could be proved, the municipality would take action. “We are very sensitive to water leaks, especially looking at the recent situation with the drought, and cannot afford to have a single drop of water going to waste. “

Ngwenya said a team would be dispatched to the area.

This is why BCM’s tariffs are higher than most and rates bills are dear