The Department of Public Works and Roads in the North West Province, under the leadership of MEC Gaoage Molapisi, continued celebrating the October Transport Month Campaign. Gaoage did this by leading the handover of a sinkhole repair and intersection improvement project at Road P137/1 at Vaal Reefs, outside Orkney in the City of Matlosana Local Municipality.
During the handover, Molapisi was accompanied by Acting Director of Roads Simon Manoto, the Executive Mayor of the City of Matlosana Local Municipality, James Tsolela, and the Members of the Mayoral Committee (MCCs) in Matlosana. The project started in July 2022, after a collapsed bridge where the department had appointed a contractor and removed the bridge to ensure the road to fit.
The project is one of the identified projects by the department to showcase some of its achievements during transport month. The P137/1 Road from Orkney, traversing on the outskirts of Khuma township, connects to the N12 highway to Potchefstroom. Molapisi said the project was supposed to be completed in September, but it was completed in August this year, which was earlier than the scheduled time due to fewer disruptions by community members.
The initial value of the construction was R83 million. However, due to unforeseen circumstances, it was revised to R91 million for 12 months. It was implemented through the Provincial Roads Maintenance Grant (PRMG). Molapisi said: "The handover of this project is part of delivering quality road infrastructure and creating jobs across the province. There is no better way to demonstrate our commitment than by showcasing and celebrating our work. Twenty nine job opportunities were created for locals, and R24 million was spent on subcontractors through this project."
The Executive Mayor Tsolela, said they are happy about the completion of the project, applauding the department's efforts to come up with a project of this kind before it could have caused incidents that eould have led to severe injuries or death while using the road due to a collapsed bridge that was in a bad and dangerous condition. Peter du Toit, the representative of Leigh Hendric Construction, a company appointed as the main contractor, said it was a complicated, diverse project with technical work.
He said they are pleased to officially hand over a completed project to the MEC where the scope of their work, included the demolition of Bridge 2128, relocation of services including existing fill up to natural ground level and stockpiling, construction of new road and at grade intersection along the old road alignment, and construction of a two-way temporary eight metre width deviation path. This includes other existing services of Eskom, two high voltage power lines, Dark Fibre Africa(DFA) for telecommunications and a live steel pipeline of Harmony Gold Company.
