Periodic Maintenance of Roads in Bonnievale and Ashton Completed

Yet another multi-million maintenance project has been completed by the Western Cape Department of Infrastructure (DOI).

“This R74.7 million DOI project to repair and reseal five stretches of road in the Bonnievale and Ashton area, and to rehabilitate 1 km of Main Road (MR) 291, was recently completed,” said Jandré Bakker, DOI Director: Operational Support. “The portions of road that were repaired and resealed were 5 km of MR289, 8.7km of MR 291, 4km of Divisional Road (DR) 1358, 2.8k m of DR1363, and 2.8 km of DR1365,” he added.

The project included:

• Undertaking maintenance work on an existing bridge;
• Localised edge repairs;
• Rebuilding eroded gravel shoulders;
• Repairing and resealing farm accesses in poor condition;
• Building new concrete-lined drains;
• Cleaning and shaping unlined drains and digging new unlined drains;
• Cleaning and shaping culvert inlet and outlet structures;
• Removing silt from culverts;
• Refurbishing guardrails and installing new guardrails;
• Installing fences; and
• Refurbishing and installing road signs.

Western Cape Minister of Infrastructure Tertuis Simmers stated, “Projects of this nature have contract participation goals. The project created 125 short-term work opportunities and 6 800 person-days of work against a target of 5450. We spent in excess of R15 million on this project. We planned to have seven local enterprises benefit from the project but ended up utilising ten.”

“Projects like these are proof that we do not only invest in the main routes and larger towns in our province. We invest in our entire road network. Road infrastructure plays a critical role in the local economy of these smaller towns. It ensures safe and reliable transport of goods and services and stimulates the local tourism sector to create more job opportunities,” Minister Simmers concluded.