Waste management

Issue:
A key concern of a wide range of stakeholders is the lack of effective management of waste in the
Inner City. Littering, illegal dumping of waste, poor management of activities such as street trading and on-street taxi-ranking, and the increase in the number of buildings with collapsing management structures, all contribute to the challenge. Waste management infrastructure and routine service delivery systems and processes have failed to respond adequately. Enforcement capacity to give effect to by-laws has also been lacking. The challenge will not decline in future.

The Inner City population will continue to grow significantly in the years ahead. In addition the Inner City economy has begun to revive and new economic activity is beginning to respond to the increases in residential densities. This will bring new businesses such as restaurants that are large contributors to the waste stream.

Unmanaged waste has a spill over negative effect in other areas. First, there is a demonstrable relationship between grime and crime. Correspondingly, efforts to remove unsightly waste restores dignity to the inhabitants and users of an area, and conveys to all a public expectation to abide by a set of common norms of conduct. Stricter by-law enforcement on issues such as littering publicly communicates a zero-tolerance approach to all infringements of the law that eventually translates into lower crime levels.

Second, excessive waste spills over into the storm water drainage system, where blockages can cause damage.

Desired outcome:
The City of Johannesburg will ensure a clean, waste-free Inner City, through the development of waste management and cleansing services operating on a 24/7 basis.

Commitments:

• A large increase in capital and operating budget will be allocated to Pikitup in the 2007/08 financial year to build a new system of waste management and street cleaning with a specific focus on the Inner City. Specific allocations are for:
  • The purchase of mechanical street sweepers;
  • The further roll-out of swivel bins on the streets of the Inner City.
  • The development of a new underground bin system. By December 2007, the City will complete the piloting of the system for commercial and residential buildings. The further roll-out will be accelerated in 2007/08 with a view to completing the system across the Inner City by 2011.
  • The implementation of a ‘100-spots’ programme similar to that implemented in Soweto in the 2000-05 term of office. This targets the complete cleanup of sites of accumulated illegally dumped waste, and, where appropriate, the conversion of the site to a small park or public space.
• A single Service Level Agreement setting out uniform outcome standards across the Inner City (and differentiated levels of effort) required for different parts of the Inner City will be signed and made public in December 2007.
• By March 2008, the City will launch a system of community waste collectors across the Inner City similar to that, which has been piloted by the JDA in Bertrams.
• By July 2008, the City will introduce a set of measures and incentives to support the development of waste compactors in all new buildings and buildings undergoing major refurbishment.
• The 2007/08 tariffs for consultation recognise the discrepancy between the charge for waste removal to properties up to 300m2 (R26,37 proposed for 2007/08) and the charge per unit for units in blocks of flats (R46,60 proposed for 2007/08). The need for revision is acknowledged.
• By December 2007 research will be undertaken and proposals made into a revised tariff structure to be implemented as from July 2008.
• By March 2008 by-laws will be revisited to adjust the schedule of fines for illegal dumping, littering and poor management of waste. Capacity to vigorously enforce these by-laws will be built as part of the urban management system.
• By December 2008 the City will launch an Inner City recycling programme that will support small and medium sized enterprises operating in the Inner City to grow sustainable waste recycling businesses.
• Before December 2007, the Gauteng Provincial Government will lead a major anti-litter campaign in the Inner City, with the participation of a wide range of community organisations.

The City of Johannesburg will support the campaign.

Parks, playgrounds and other public places

Issue:
International comparison suggests an acceptable benchmark of 2 hectares of quality public open space per 1000 residents in dense urban settings. By this measure the Inner City of Johannesburg has a severe dearth of parks and playgrounds to cater for its rapidly increasing population.

The current lack of quality public spaces means existing parks and playgrounds are over-utilised. In addition, a lack of accessible community sports facilities means that parks originally designed for passive recreation now have to cater for active recreational usage. As a result the available public open space has been significantly degraded within a short period of time. The City needs to upgrade existing public open space, and also develop new space taking into account innovative new concepts such as tot-lots/pocket parks.

Desired outcomes:
The City of Johannesburg wishes to achieve a liveable Inner City with sustainable and cohesive
neighbourhoods in which all people, whether wealthy or not, can live in dignified circumstances.

Such neighbourhoods require culturally appropriate and authentic public places that are accessible to all. To realise this, the City will work with all stakeholders to increase the amount of space within or immediately adjacent to the Inner City that is made up of parks, playgrounds and other quality public places.

The aim will be to see at least 5% of total space within the boundaries of the current UDS developed as quality public open space, and to ensure that no person needs to walk more than 300 meters to find either hard or soft public open space. This will be achieved by 2015.

In line with sustainable cities principles and specific Department of Environment and City Parks objectives, all new and refurbished public open spaces will be designed, developed and upgraded in a manner that is compliant with ecological best practice in respect of storm-water attenuation and run-off management, heat island effect mitigation, etc.

Commitments:

• By December 2007 the City of Johannesburg will draft an implementation plan for a coherent approach to upgrading and maintaining existing, but currently dysfunctional, open spaces and parks. This plan will be rolled out by March 2009. Key parks to be re-developed include the Alec Gorschell Park; the Donald Mackay Park; the End Street Park; the Pieter Roos Park, the Wilds, and others. Opportunities will be sought for creative approaches to the management of public open space where appropriate, including co-management arrangements with property owners/ developers and community organisations.
• By March 2008, the City of Johannesburg will, together with stakeholders, identify possible new spaces to contribute towards the desired outcome. In this plan it will:
  • Explore the development of “Partnership Places”, to be co-designed and co-managed with communities. For example, the residents and management of the eKhaya precinct has identified three spaces that should be upgraded into landscaped public places, such places to be managed by the precinct;
  • Following the Main Street model, explore the development of other “Partnership Places”, to be co-designed and co-managed with the private sector under an arrangement that guarantees public accessibility;
  • Develop simplified procedures for lease agreements over public places re management and maintenance;
  • Identify potential buildings to be released from the Better Buildings Programme or City of Johannesburg owned property that can be demolished to make way for public open space;
  • Develop new public open space concepts that can feasibly be developed in the dense urban landscape of the Inner City. Special attention will be given to so-called pocket parks or tot-lots.
• As a major intervention the City will investigate the feasibility of constructing a linear, continuous public open space ‘spine’ from Yeoville Ridge, through Pullinger Kop, and down along the End Street Park. Extension of the spine in the space behind the Windybrow theatre, and even innovative approaches to decking the railway line to the south of the Johannesburg Art Gallery, may also be investigated.
  • A feasibility and business / development plan will be completed by July 2008;
  • If the feasibility plan concludes the idea is viable, the development and upgrade will be completed by March 2010;
  • A management agreement will be in place by September 2008.
• Other key public open space interventions to be investigated by March 2008 include:
  Braamfontein Cemetery; a park at the base of the Hillbrow Tower; a major park east of the Supreme Court and West of Joe Slovo Drive to cater for the large number of conversions from office to residential currently underway; and public open space close to the Standard Bank Superblock.
• Within the process of upgrading existing public spaces and creating new spaces, the City of Johannesburg will identify and configure a number of places that can be used as Fanfest Spaces for the 2010 Soccer World Cup. These will be developed by March 2010. Design and development will ensure that these spaces remain as appropriate, meaningful and well-used legacy places after the World Cup event has concluded.
• Public spaces will be developed in a way that encourages and enables the installation of public art in alignment with the City’s Public Art Policy of 2006.

Walkable streets / public environment upgrading

Issue:
Recent systematic upgrading of streets in Braamfontein and along Main Street shows what can be done if a concerted effort is made to ensure that the public environment is safe and walkable and dignified.

These upgraded spaces attract private sector property investment, and convey a sense of dignity and pride to Inner City residents who have come to experience significant degradation in the urban environment. However, most Inner City streets still remain un-refurbished, cluttered, and, in particular, un-walkable after dark. The opportunity for some streets to be pedestrianised has not been fulfilled. Some pedestrian thoroughfares need to be upgraded. Alleyways are not well managed.

Outcomes:
The City of Johannesburg, in partnership with private sector property owners and communities, will work consistently towards a walkable Inner City, with a safe, clean and green public environment in a good state of repair, and with streets connected to appropriate and interesting public open spaces and or iconic public places.

Commitments:

• The City will develop a comprehensive Inner City streetscape / public environment upgrade plan by December 2007, and implement this fully in a phased manner by March 2011. This upgrade will include:
  • New paving;
  • The planting of street trees;
  • The rolling out of edge treatments in line with ecological principles for managing run-off;
  • Street trading management;
  • Provision and maintenance of clean public amenities;
  • The provision of appropriate street furniture (seating, bus-stops etc);
  • The replacement of existing lighting, and the provision of new lighting suited for a pedestrian environment;
  • The provision of refuse bins;
  • The replacement of manhole covers;
  • The integration of all ICDS / BRT stops with walkable street network and public places;
  • The upgrade of relevant facades and foyers adjacent to semi-public places, such facades and foyers to be identified in agreement with the CoJ;
  • The ongoing monitoring of visual clutter.
  • Upgrading of identified priority streets and precinct areas will be implemented by December 2009. Amongst others, key streets will include:
  • Rissik Street as a processional boulevard;
  • Kerk Street as east/west connector, pedestrian priority road, with limited and managed linear market;
  • Diagonal Street as pedestrian priority and partnership space in alignment with relevant development framework;
  • Eloff Street reconfigured and re-landscaped as pedestrian priority, high level retail use at ground floor and public transport dedicated lanes;
  • Pritchard Street as connector spanning Diagonal Street, High Court Precinct, Fashion Kapitol and End Street;
  • The completion of Main Street as pedestrian priority to complete the link with ABSA campus.
  • Key precinct areas to receive foremost priority will include:
    • Hillbrow/Berea;
    • Doornfontein;
    • Fashion District;
    • Fordsburg/Pageview; and
    • Others to be determined.
• In the process of upgrading the public environment City departments and municipal entities will work together in a co-ordinated manner in line with commonly agreed guidelines, design principles and standards. As far as possible departments and entities will sequence their maintenance and repair work to ensure that it does not undo upgrading just completed. The City will also make every effort to ensure that non-City enterprises – notably Telkom and iGoli Gas – also take into account City led street-upgrading plans in their own maintenance planning and repair work.
• As part of a structured “Partnership Places” agreement facilitated through JICBC, selected private sector partners will lead and fund a complimentary programme of public-environment upgrades in key areas (the programme will be operationalised through leases, management and maintenance agreements as per the established practice of recent street upgrades such as Main Street).
• Private sector property owners will assist the City of Johannesburg with litter removal, monitoring, managing and maintenance of pavements and street edges adjacent to their own properties.
• Where possible and appropriate, private sector property owners will work with the City of Johannesburg to open up and upgrade semi-public spaces (e.g. bases adjacent footprint of buildings, wide entrances to buildings, ground floors and foyers) in alignment with design principles adopted by the streetscape upgrade programme, such places to be identified and agreed with the City.
• Through JICBC structures the City will work to promote alternatives to existing steel rollershutter options, to provide more light and interest on the streets at night, without compromising the safety of ground-floor business.

Iconic Public Places

Issue:
Over the last five years a number of new ‘iconic’ public place projects have been completed.

These include Constitutional Hill, Drill Hall and Mary Fitzgerald Square. These ‘iconic’ public place projects are distinguished from other public spaces described in Issue 1 above in that they are generally focused on a building or cluster of buildings as opposed to an open space; have strong symbolic, cultural or heritage significance; are key tourism destinations; have served as so called ripple-pond investments, often within broader area focused/precinct re-development projects; and have provided key new geographical anchor points to the urban form and fabric of the Inner City.

While they have made an enormous contribution to the regeneration of the Inner City, a challenge with some of the iconic public places that have been developed over the last five years is that they have not yet reached their full potential. Some have not been fully completed, with completion delayed due to a number of administrative factors. Some are not yet accessible to or well utilised by the public. Some are yet to see the establishment and full capacitation of an institutional arrangement with secure operating finance that is able to maintain the facility in good order.

Apart from the iconic public places that have already been developed, there are also a number of further opportunities for major public place interventions that have not yet been realised. The most obvious example is the Gauteng Provincial Government Precinct / Square.

Desired outcomes:
The City of Johannesburg, working with a range of stakeholders, wishes to see the iconic public spaces developed over the last few years reach their full potential and achieve full operational sustainability. It also wishes to see other new opportunities for iconic public space implemented in order to complete the spatial picture of an interesting, attractive and liveable Inner City.

Commitments:

• Working with stakeholders the City of Johannesburg will finalise a sustainable management and financing model for all key iconic public places by December 2007. This will resolve some of the outstanding issues holding back the completion of some of the developments.
• Through the leadership of various stakeholders, feasibility and business plans for the development of a number of other key iconic public place projects will be finalised by March 2008. These may include the Old Park Station and the Gauteng Provincial Government Precinct Square, as well as others.
• To rehabilitate the site of the Worker’s Library in the heart of Newtown, the City will promote and facilitate the development of a world class museum of labour migration by March 2010.

The visual cityscape

Issue:
The visual appearance of most dynamic central cities is almost invariably busy. However, concern has been raised that the visual appearance of the Johannesburg Inner City is becoming unnecessarily cluttered through an excess of inappropriate outdoor advertising and building wraps.

In addition, there is evidence that in the difficult rental market for both commercial and residential property, wrapping an Inner City in advertising may sometimes bring in more reliable revenue than would fully letting the building. This provides a strong negative incentive against re-investment.

A careful balance must be struck between different interests. On the one hand the interests of property owners and advertisers must be respected within clearly established rules of the game.

On the other hand the desire of a general public for a cityscape that is not overwhelmed by inappropriate visual clutter must also be recognised.

A related issue is the quality of architecture and urban design. In rapidly redeveloping inner cities, especially where there is a concern to meet pressing demand for new uses such as residential space, there is a risk that architecture and urban design of lasting quality, that is rooted in local contexts and reflects prevailing societal norms and desires, may be sacrificed for mere functionality. In its 5-year IDP, the City of Johannesburg has committed itself to improving urban design, both by stimulating debate about good urban design and by setting out appropriate principles.

Desired outcomes:
The City of Johannesburg wishes to see a visually coherent cityscape without excessive clutter from too many inappropriate outdoor adverts and building wraps, and with quality architecture and urban design appropriate to the local context.

Commitments:

• By December 2007 the City of Johannesburg will review its current policy governing outdoor advertising and building wraps through a consultative process involving a range of stakeholders.
• As part of this review the City will introduce strict regulations prohibiting the full wrapping of buildings on a semi-permanent or permanent basis, in lieu of using the building for its established use.
• The City will make every effort to collect revenue from outdoor advertising due to it, with funds accruing from outdoor advertising in the Inner City being devoted to public environment upgrading in the area.

Public events and public art

Issue:
Public open space, walkable streets and iconic public places should not be static spaces.

Once refurbished, they provide ample opportunities for more active usage on a planned basis, either through public cultural events or through dynamic forms of public art.

The annual Diwali festival in Newtown or the New Year’s eve Carnival through the streets of the Inner City demonstrate the opportunities.

Desired outcomes:

• The City of Johannesburg will scale up a programme of sustainable public events such as festivals and carnivals to be run in Inner City streets, parks and public places.
• A calendar of possible events will be drafted for public input by September 2007, and developed for roll-out on an annual basis from July 2008. A steering committee of City officials and stakeholders will be constituted to develop and oversee the implementation of the programme. Together with the finalisation of a calendar of public events, the City will develop mechanisms to ensure the proper and sustainable financing, organisation, marketing and management of all events to occur in public places.
• The City will translate its public art policy into a clear public art programme that plans and schedules the roll-out of key public art interventions and installations in tandem with the redevelopment of public spaces and streets. The envisaged public art installations may be of a temporary or permanent nature. Planning and roll-out will be done in close consultation with key stakeholders.
• The City will also work with various civil society organisations to support well-managed organised activities in parks, with a special focus on the needs of children. The City will investigate the waiving of a community tariff applied when community organisations make use of public parks for their own activities, if it can be demonstrated that the activities have clear development objective. A new approach will be determined by June 2008.

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