Numerous concerns from community members regarding the degradation of road along William Nicol at the Mulbarton and Uranium Road intersection (Leaping Frog Shopping Centre) have been received and noted by Steyn City Properties.
Although Steyn City Properties is not responsible for the upgrade itself, the developers have provided a bulk contribution of R300 million towards the William Nicol upgrade by Gautrans in order to fast track the inevitable infrastructure project to improve traffic accessibility and flow to this rapidly developing urban area.
Comments Giuseppe Plumari of Steyn City Properties, “It is unfortunate that the past few days of heavy rain has not helped the situation and naturally caused additional damage to this particular section of road works. Steyn City Properties empathises with commuters along this stretch of William Nicol and has taken it upon ourselves to restore the damaged section of road at the intersection as soon as possible in the interest of daily commuters.”
Gautrans has published the following estimated timelines of the intersection’s upgrade as a guideline for expected completion dates:
· Uranium Road is expected to be complete by the end of March 2014
· Mulbarton Road is expected to be complete by the end of May 2014
· The Southbound lanes on William Nicol are expected to be complete by September 2014
· The Northbound lanes on William Nicol are expected to be complete by November 2014
Gautrans has indicated the following challenges as the main reasons for the node’s traffic congestion:
· The traffic pointsmen on duty during the day are being attacked or threatened by taxi drivers if they are stopped or in an attempt to control the traffic.
· The volumes of traffic through the intersection varies considerably day-by-day and over a month period making it very difficult to anticipate what is required in terms of temporary deviations.
· The rain has resulted in the contractor having to stop work on the culvert due to flooding of the works making it dangerous to work in the deep excavation.
· Parts of the temporary road deviation was washed away due to recent storms and required rebuilding, thereby slowing down traffic. Everything possible is being done to tackle these major repairs outside of peak traffic hours but this is not always possible.
· The completion of the main services culvert south of the intersection has been affected by last minute changes to designs required by the services’ owners.
· The level differences between the existing roadway and final roadway is making the implementation of temporary road deviations problematic.
· Last minute changes to increase the number of traffic lanes on K46 from two in each direction to three has affected the programme for completion of the upgrading work by six months.
Once the William Nicol upgrade has reached completion, the six-lane dual carriage way will better service the area’s traffic flow and the Uranium / Mulbarton intersection will have improved significantly. With the end of the rainy season in sight, the project should experience an improvement in pace.