Heritage Cases

The project is to upgrade the existing gravel road between the R61 at St Marks to Sabelele Village, a distance of approximately 19km, from a gravel road to surface standard (see yellow line in map below). Sabelele Village is noteworthy as the birthplace of Chris Hani and the upgraded road would, amongst other benefits, improve access to the memorial in the Village. The project is located within the Intsika Yethu Local Municipality of the Chris Hani District Municipality. The nearest major centre is the town of Cofimvaba located approximately 20km to the east along the R61 and Queenstown located approximately 55km to the west. The upgraded road would have an asphalt pavement width of 6.8 m (two 3.4 m lanes) with a 0.9 m wide shoulder on each side of the road (total road width therefore 8.6 m). Along most of the alignment this is wider than the existing 5 - 6 m road width. The existing road includes a number of river bridges of varying standard plus a number of low level and narrow causeways. At all river crossings, bridge widening or reconstruction will be required. The design speed of the road will not be changed and consequently horizontal and vertical alignment changes will be minor, and usually associated with crossing of rivers (for new bridges). These details will be provided in the Basic Assessment Report Assessments will also be done for the utilisation and development of borrow pits (existing and new) and one hard rock quarry along the road. An application will be submitted to the Department of Mineral Resources.