We’re on the road to nowhere…

Update: There was a good response to my original post on Cape Town’s unfinished freeways. Ella Smook wrote a follow up article in the Cape Argus on 01 September (see full story below), following which John Maytham picked up the debate on Cape Talk radio.

What do you think? Should the Foreshore Freeways be:

a) completed

b) demolished and routed underground

c) left as is, or

d) left as is, but with the ‘unfinished’ sections deleted?

My colleague, Rob Kane, wrote me the following: 

In a dim past I used to be a (not very good) structural engineer and I think that the protruding bits of freeway are needed to ‘balance’ the length of freeway on the other side of the supporting column. Demolition may be expensive. I think the space under the freeways (and on top) should be used for low cost housing.

I like Rob’s thinking. I wrote a few months back about the New York High Line where a new urban park has been created on top of a disused raised railway line. Could we be as innovative in Cape Town? Can we think of ways to used the unfinished bits of the freeways, rather than knock them off? Let me know your views.

See also a recent article on the benefits of tearing down elevated freeways in the US by Neil Pierce: http://citiwire.net/post/2241/

Cape Town's World Design Capital 2014 Bid has used the unfinished freeways as a symbol of how the city could be redesigned

Original post:

“We’re on a road to nowhere, Come on inside. Taking that ride to nowhere, We’ll take that ride”

Talking Heads was one of my favourite bands in the 1980s. Their whimsical ‘Road to Nowhere’ appeared on their popular 1985 album ‘Little Creatures’. And guess what song popped into my head yesterday when I was driving past the unfinished foreshore freeways?

One of the legacies of the World Cup is that we can have confidence in our collective ability as a city to think and plan big and work together to make things happen. Well, when are we going to think and plan big, and make it happen, in terms of the unfinished freeways on the Cape Town foreshore?

I know there are many other competing priorities in our city - housing, unemployment, education, health, basic services – but when are we going to grasp the nettle and agree that the second phase of the foreshore freeways as originally planned will never be built, and that the extra bits must now come down to make space for other needs?

Green Point needs to reconnect to the sea. The Waterfront needs to be integrated into the CBD (including removing the wall around the old tank farm basin that currently forms a major barrier). The central city as a whole needs to reconnect to the sea and harbour that gave it its character for 300 years.

And all the dead space and unused road space between these areas must be used in support of projects such as the Provincial Urban Regeneration project, which seeks to leverage public assets for socio-economic benefit, including affordable housing in order to bring people back into the city.

For this to happen, we need a bold vision (think and plan big) and a coalition of the willing (working together to make things happen). First and foremost, we need a decision from the City of Cape Town that the freeways will not be completed, and that the unused bits will be excised with the same precision as the recent demolition of the Athlone Towers.

We’ll then at least be on the road to somewhere…

Great Central City area, but cut-off by dead spaces and concrete barriers

Wednesday September 01, 2010

”Unfinished freeways must go” by Ella Smook, Cape Argus

It”s time for Cape Town”s incomplete freeways on the Foreshore to go, says Andrew Boraine, chief executive of the Cape Town Partnership.

“We need a decision from the City of Cape Town that the freeways will not be completed and that the unused bits will be excised with the same precision as the recent demolition of the Athlone Towers,” he said.

In 2002, the Cape Town Chamber of Commerce warned that the completion of the Foreshore freeway was “a big unresolved issue” that could affect the development of the central business district and the economy of the city.

At the time, chamber director Albert Schuitmaker said the issue could not be left unresolved indefinitely.

“We need a decision on whether or not it is going to happen, because this could affect every other transport and development decision in the city,” he was quoted as saying.

In March that year, the provincial government launched “a broad inclusive participatory planning process” to “reach consensus as to the appropriate development framework and transport solution to the Foreshore area”.

Four years later, city transport director Maddie Mazaza said that although the city wanted to complete the freeway, there was no budget to do so.

And in 2007, the provincial parliament heard that the fly-overs would not be completed before the World Cup this year because of a lack of funds.

Earlier this year, Boraine wrote on his blog, “Cities for people” that he was “struck by the sheer waste of space” on the Foreshore, and listed a number of desirable outcomes for the improved use of the space.

The “booby prize” would be to allow the status quo – no decision on completing the freeways – to continue, leaving a “barren urban wasteland” in place indefinitely, he said at the time.

“I know there are many other competing priorities in our city – housing, unemployment, education, health, basic services – but when are we going to grasp the nettle and agree that the second phase of the Foreshore freeways as originally planned will never be built, and that the extra bits must now come down to make space for other needs?” Boraine asked this week.

He told the Cape Argus that a significant amount of land was being “sterilised” by freeways that were never going to be completed, and that the land could be put to much better use by demolishing the unfinished portions and using the “dead space” for projects such as the provincial urban-regeneration project, housing and mixed-use developments. Furthermore, the entire city should be reconnected to the Waterfront and the sea.

“Let”s just bite the bullet. We are calling for a decision to be made rather than be postponed,” said Boraine.

The overpasses were never completed because traffic volumes did not justify it, said City transport head Mike Marsden. “The idea was to complete it when traffic volumes required it, an acceptable engineering concept at the time. ”

Their major function since has been as a movie set to the local and international productions – and parking space for the world”s biggest vuvuzela.

It might take a while for the city to take the first step and make the decision.

Mayoral committee member for transport, roads and stormwater Elizabeth Thompson said she had repeatedly been asked what was being done about “unfinished bridges”.

At this stage neither their being knocked down nor their completion was on the agenda, she said. Although the city was looking at options and the “many proposals” made, the bridges would remain as they were “for now”, she added.

“They have been there so long. It is going to take a lot of money to complete a project someone else started. ”

Ward councillor Belinda Walker said that in the long term everyone would be delighted to see the freeways taken down to free up land and reconnect the city with the sea.

The freeways, both completed and uncompleted, inhibited “sensible planning” in the City Bowl area as far as Woodstock, said Walker. Funding was the main problem.

“I agree they do not look good and we need to come to a conclusion. But what would it cost and what would the added value be?” she asked.

Cape Argus