Brambles Stop the City of Joburg

It has been nearly 2 weeks since the sewerage blockage was reported to the City of Johannesburg, and still it is overflowing into a stream which then flows into a small river that flows over a huge waterfall into the Walter Sisulu National Botanical Gardens. Even its neighbouring city, Mogale City has put them to shame, as another much larger leak was reported late last Sunday upstream from this leak, and it was unblocked within the hour, and fully repaired the very next morning.

The reason Joburg Water has given why they can't fix the blocked drain is that it is inaccessible due to thick brambles as seen above. Yes believe me somewhere in the middle of this mess is a sewer that is spewing up raw sewerage. So for 2 weeks the City Parks, who are more than capable in clearing out the brambles have not come to clear away the brambles which are enjoying the lush nutrient rich sewerage while the Sanitation Department of Joburg Water just idly sit by and watch the brambles grow.

Sorry for by dumping the blame on these 2 departments of the City of Joburg (excuse the pun) but we can't allow for raw sewerage to flow unabated for 2 weeks into a national treasure like the Botanical Gardens. Is it a lack of resources, man-power or budget that is stopping them from fixing the damaged infrastructure. Surely it is not the brambles that are stopping the City of Joburg from doing their job.

New Water Meter

Wow, the Joburg Water has strange times. We reported a problem with our old water meter as how can we use R11,000 worth of water in 1 month without even a water leak. After reporting the leak, they sent out a team to check our water meter, they arrived just a little over 22h00 on a Saturday night. The lady foreman was barefeet and soaking wet. She said that she just came from a bad water leak that they just repaired and all her clothes are wet including her shoes.

After a visual inspection they said that there was nothing that they could see wrong with our meter and that if we wanted to get it tested, we had to pay R3,400 and the Joburg Water will take out the old meter, put in the new type of meter, which our entire street has except us, and have the old one tested.

We paid the amount to the City of Joburg and this Sunday afternoon they came and installed the new one, and took the old one away for testing.