Programme Director,
The MEC for Roads and Transport: MEC Ismail Vadi,
Councillors here present,
Ladies and Gentlemen.
We meet here today, once again, to bear witness to a significant intervention we are making as the Gauteng Provincial Government to ensure that our province has a world class, state-of-the-art roads network.
Only last week, MEC Vadi officially opened a R 110 million project, where we rehabilitated parts of the N12 freeway.
The project we are launching today is worth over R300 million and is expected to improve the structural and functional condition of N14 freeway. This project is therefore a worthy investment in improving the quality of our roads infrastructure now and in the future.
We are encouraged by the skills development as well as the economic empowerment opportunities that this project will provide. Equally and as we know this road is significant in that it connects Centurion in our Northern Development Corridor and Krugersdorp in our Western Development Corridor.
It also serves as an alternative route to important locations such as the Sandton CBD, Lanseria Airport and the Diepsloot Township. Its rehabilitation therefore will bring major benefits in terms of improved mobility of goods and people in these areas.
Programme Director, we are delighted that many more similar projects will be unveiled in all our development corridors. In the Central Development Corridor we have already completed the reconstruction of the William Nicol Drive. Work is continuing to upgrade Cedar Road and the K46 into dual carriage ways.
In the Northern Development Corridor we will complete the reconstruction of the R511 from Erasmia to Diepsloot on the N14 and a portion of Garsfontein Road will become a dual carriageway. In the Eastern Development Corridor, we will upgrade the R103 into a dual carriageway between Van Dyk Road and Diana Road.
In the Southern Development Corridor we have completed 50 per cent of the construction of Phase 2 of the R82 into a dual carriageway between Eikenhof and Walkerville. Our major intervention in the Western Development Corridor, is the rehabilitation of the N12 freeway from Eldorado Park up to the boundary with the North West Province.
In addition to the work we are doing as the provincial government, all our municipalities are also undertaking projects to improve our roads network. Collectively, we are turning the Gauteng City Region into one massive construction site as we move with full speed towards improving our roads infrastructure.
By doing all of this work we are delivering on the commitment we have made to the people of Gauteng that we will work hard to upgrade and maintain our key arterial routes. We are also ensuring that we keep our roads network in good condition as part of accelerating our advance towards the goals of our programme of radical Transformation, Modernisation and Reindustrialisation.
This we can say without fear of contradiction that an efficient and well maintained roads network is a necessary pre-requisite for us to succeed in implementing the TMR. We know too well that roads play a critical role in unlocking economic growth and development; in connecting people and in promoting spatial integration.
Roads take people out of isolation; they bring them closer to work and other economic opportunities; they open up opportunities for people to build for themselves sustainable livelihoods. Roads reduce distance between people, markets and services. They make it possible for people to access knowledge and thus empower themselves.
A well maintained and world class roads network also saves lives as it reduces fatalities on our roads. As we launch this important initiative we take this opportunity to reiterate our commitment to also improve the road network and rollout public transport infrastructure across the Gauteng City Region (GCR).
All these new roads will not be tolled.
We are honouring our commitment to the people of our province that government will continue to invest in alternative roads and public transport. We want to connect the east to the west, south to the north of Gauteng. We want to connect all five corridors of the GCR in order to have a seamlessly integrated economy and cities.
The upgrading of N14 and related infrastructure investment such as energy, water, sanitation and other public transport infrastructure will unlock the development of the new Lanseria City development as a new logistics hub and economic node in the north-western part of our province where many poor people live in the periphery of the urban core.
We also want to build proper roads in townships as part of transforming our townships into vibrant and sustainable centres of economic activity and thriving hubs of cultural life. Like we did in Soweto, Diepsloot will also have proper roads, proper houses, proper schools, a proper police station and sporting facilities and social amenities.
I want to conclude by sending out a strong message to Diepsloot taxi operators who are currently involved in taxi violence that they should stop shooting and killing one another. We want to work with the taxi industry to solve transport problems but we can't work with people who are violent.
I also want to call on communities to work with government to monitor all infrastructure projects in order to ensure that they are delivered on time and on budget. There is a growing tendency that projects create tensions and conflict in communities among beneficiaries. Any community member who disrupt or stop projects should be brought to book.
Thank you!
