OPINION & LETTERS30 January 2009 Page 7

A Very Grand PrizeTreat new streetnames with respect

MAYOR Obed Mlaba presents an award to Nokuthula Seme, one of the top 10 matrics fromdisadvantaged schools in eThekwini. The 10 each received R10 000 from Nedbank Head ofCorporate Banking in KZN, Mavric Webbstock. Send your Durban photographs to eZasegagasiniMetro, PO Box 5588, Durban, 4001; or e-mail naidoothrusha@durban.gov.za and we will publish thebest high-resolution photos. Please provide your details and the names of the people in your picture

SOUTH Africahas come a longway to be whereit is today.

Many SouthAfricans gave theirlives so that we couldlive in a just andequitable society.

Some of us are fortunate becausewe survived the apartheidonslaught and are today in aposition to bear witness to the fruitsof our hard-earned democracy.

Our government decided tohonour those fallen heroes andheroines. It is simply not possible toerect statues all over the country inrecognition of their contribution.The least that government could dowas to name a few streets afterthem.

So, it is a great pity that we stillfind people bent on counter-revolutionary tendencies.

South Africa belongs to all of usand if we deface the names on thestreet signs we are indirectlyobliterating our own history.

The actions of those who defacestreet names cannot be interpretedin any other way but as an act ofracial prejudice, motivated by

political bias. As the people of

this region, let us takethe lead in showingthe country that wetranscend politicalsectarianism and arecommitted tobuilding one nation

that is proud of its heroes andheroines, irrespective of theircolour.

It should be the responsibility ofevery South African citizen toprotect these national symbols andwe should all strive to promotethose things that bring us togetheras a nation.

To underline this responsibilityand to show how seriously we viewthis vandalism, senior leaders of theeThekwini Municipality, myselfincluded, recently took it uponourselves to go out and clean someof the defaced street names.

Let us now refrain fromvandalising these signs and anyother symbol that is aimed atrecognising the contribution of ourfallen patriots.

Vandalism is a criminal offenceand the law will be allowed to takeits course.

ObedMlabaeThekwiniMayor

LETTERS

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Large trucks damagerobots, kerbs, pavementsWELCOME

to 2009!Anincredibly

successful festiveseason is now behindus, and may I thankour residents and thestaff of eThekwini forall they did to keep usas South Africa’s number onetourist destination.

Of course this year is expected tobe a busy one.

Politically, the elections willdominate matters for the firstquarter of the year and could wellhave implications for our city’spolitical leadership profile.

At a developmental level we arestill fixing up the damage createdby the recent storms.

Our City was hard hit and thecontractors working to buildhouses have had to be directedover the festive period to fixthousands of houses affectedduring the storm damage.

The situation is serious and manyfamilies have been hard hit.

We all know climate change isupon us, with precipitation andwinds being stronger and thelikelihood of droughts has alsoincreased.

I would urge everyone to carefullyplan, given our changing times.

The City’s 2010 and Beyondprogramme is taking great shapeand many of its major projects arespringing up all over the city.

Our iconic Moses Mabhidastadium makes us all proud and werecently completed the arch,which, connected to thecompression ring by cables, willhold up the roof.

That stadium will be finished thisyear and work has already begunon the People’s Park, beachfrontregeneration and the like.

The redevelopment of Warwick,including the public transportlanes will serve our citywonderfully.

And by the end ofthe year we will havethree greatlyrevamped stadia, inKing GoodwillZwelithini, Sugar RayXulu and PrincessMagogo.

The increasedpressure to deliver

also means greater scrutiny, andthose of us in the public servicemust do all we can to improve ourservice delivery.

I have visited some Municipalunits and we are finding that whilewell over 90% of our staff arepassionate and excited aboutworking for our people, there aresome who bring us into disreputeand don’t deserve to even have ajob. They should go, and bereplaced by those who arecommitted to working hard toimprove the lives of our people.

We must all start working towards2010.

We are under attack for notcleaning up parts of the city, forallowing grass verges and parks toget out of shape, for not fixingrobots immediately and for havinga lackadaisical attitude.

While some of that criticism isunfair, much is correct and I haveurged our staff to work harder andsmarter than ever before.

But this also means that thepublic we serve must become moreresponsible.

The litter on our streets is therenot because of municipalemployees, but because of peoplelittering.

We must continually challengethose who deface walls, litter ourstreets, drive irresponsibly anddrunk and knock down robots, anddo things that they shouldn’t.

Together we can make a realdifference and that’s what this yearmust be devoted to as we focus ourattention on doing what we do best– keeping on making our City thebest place in the world to be!

MichaelSutcliffe eThekwiniManager

We need to workharder and smarter

Possible solution to Berea congestion

I AM AMAZED at the number ofrobots that are forever beingflattened in eThekwini.

The most recent I have seen wasin my neighbourhood, Montclair,at the intersection of KenyonHowden and Montclair roads, andKenyon Howden and South Coastroads.

Other robots appeared not tohave been struck by vehicles athigh speeds, but had been pushedover, as marks left on polessuggested.

When a pole is hit violently akink is left in the pole and there is“shrapnel”. There was none at therobots I inspected.

I have also noticed evidence thatbig trucks, some pulling longtrailers, had mounted kerbs.Scrape marks on these trailersseemed to match the height ofrobots.

Some trucks are now so longthey are unable to make turns onurban roads without mountingkerbs. Is there not a limit to theirlength?

And how about the limit of axleweights on suburban roads?

Height limits are also needed, asevidenced by the number ofoverhead robots being smashed.Even overhead information signson the M4 are being smashed.

DAVID FAIFERMontclair

THERE are indeed legislatedweight, height and lengthrestrictions applicable to trucks.

As a City, we design our roads,intersections and signals in termsof these legislated parameters.

However, the government is inconstant battle with truckingcompanies that do not adhere tothese limitations.

From a traffic signals point ofview, trucks over the legal heightlimit constantly damage ouroverhead signals.

Signal poles are pushed over maybe due to the fact that as a portcity, a large number of trucks movethrough the area.

We have to place our signal poleswhere they are visible to motorists,but this also leaves themvulnerable to buses and largetrucks that mount kerbs, etc.

We are taking the followinginitiatives to ensure that order ismaintained:

❏ We are implementing anelectronic height enforcementproject for large vehicles.

❏ We have started to number allour signal poles across the city.Wecan then track which poles aremore frequently knocked downand reposition them when they arereinstated.

❏ Lastly, we are going to startsetting our signal poles furtheraway from kerbs at newintersections. This is to reduce therisk of damage to signals. However,there is a legal limit to how faraway from the kerb we can placeour signal poles.

ANDREW AUCAMPManager: Urban Traffic ControleThekwini Transport Authority

ANYONE who has driven on KingDinuzulu (Berea) Road latelywould have experienced trafficchaos and the past few weekshave been even worse.

How could town planningschedule works on Mazisi Kunene(Ridge), Lena Ahrens (Manning),Musgrave and Cleaver roads all tocoincide? I suspect that once thework is complete, traffic frominland and from the north –

Musgrave and King Dinuzuluroads would all converge into asingle lane in Hunt Road.

Cars in Hunt Road are alwaysparked on the yellow lines andthere are never police in sight.

Why not revert to two ways fromthe Stephen Dlamini (Essenwood)Road bridge, as at present twolanes feed into four lanes on thebridge, which is unnecessary.

This, and making Hunt Road a

one-way, would help relievecongestion and ease road rage.

Please take some action andpenalise parking offenders.

JOAN ANTHONYVause Road

THIS letter has been forwarded tothe relevant departments.We hopeto publish a response in our nextedition. – Editor