Mossel Bay hosts informal settlement talk
The 24th Informal Settlement Support Programme (ISSP) Forum meeting was hosted in Mossel Bay this month.
The meeting was a first to be held at a regional level and organised by the Provincial Department of Infrastructure. All seven B municipalities of the Garden Route region, Bitou, Knysna, George, Kannaland, Oudtshoorn, Mossel Bay and Hessequa attended as well as Garden Route District Municipality and other relevant state departments such as Water and Sanitation, Environmental Affairs and Development Planning and the Western Cape Department of Infrastructure were also present.
A site visit was conducted, focusing on the upgrading of KwaNonqaba informal settlement as an example of best practice to unlock discussions, which was then followed by a workshop at the Mossel Bay Town Hall.
The site visit included the Transand camp in KwaNonqaba, where the 69 serviced sites were developed through the Upgrading of the Informal Settlements Programme (UISP).
Participants were shown around the site and were allowed to pose questions to Mossel Bay Municipality on the strategies, challenges and lessons learnt while implementing the UISP on the 69 serviced stands of Transand. An opportunity was presented to the representatives to interact with Transand beneficiaries, who were recently relocated to their serviced sites.
The group then also visited the Temporary Relocation Area (TRA) site in Sewende Laan, where 250 temporary structures are erected for the purpose of accommodating beneficiaries in cases of relocation and sites being developed.
Super blocking
The main focus of the workshop hosted in the town hall, was on so-called super blocking, a spatial planning process towards upgrading informal settlements. This programme is not yet implemented in the Garden Route District. The current focus is on Upgrading of the Informal Settlements (UISP) by means of serviced sites, whereas the super blocking programme’s approach is to develop roads infrastructure within the informal settlements, to create access for the provision of services to informal settlements.
Super blocking is an upgrading, focused on improving living conditions and security where people reside. Just like any other housing programme, there are always implementation challenges. This includes the high density within informal settlements which prevents provision of basic services, the resistance by residents to relocate to a suitable site and the availability of suitable land.
Super blocking, however, has several positive outcomes, which include easy transport access in informal settlements; provision of communal water taps and toilets per block; access for emergency services (fire engines and ambulances); and roads can act as fire breaks within the blocked areas.
The forum meeting was a great success, with attendees gaining a better understanding of the challenges facing informal settlement upgrading and learning some important lessons through the experience of stakeholders involved in the process.
Participants were shown around the site and were allowed to pose questions to Mossel Bay Municipality.