The NKRA is grateful for the support provided in the 4th Street park by our park sponsors RUSSELL FISHER PROPERTIES and VISION TACTICAL SECURITY and the KILLARNEY MALL, and for the street cleaning services provided by RCS SECURITY SERVICES.

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NEWSLETTER – MAY 2012

NEWSLETTER – MAY 2012

MUNICIPAL BUDGET PROBLEMS
Our Ward Councillor, Marcelle Ravid, is one of the members of the Section 79 Transportation Committee. She has reported back to us that the Johannesburg Roads Agency (JRA) is “in dire straits”. They are struggling to obtain bitumen, which limits their ability to attend to pothole repairs and reinstatements. They also have severe budget restrictions, which is impacting negatively on their ability to attend to the maintenance of pavements, roads and storm water drains, dangerous missing manhole covers and traffic lights. Among other things, this means that the water repair at corner 2nd Avenue and Riviera Road has still not been completed, and the pavement along 3rd Street outside Chartwell cannot be repaired this year.
Please use the call centre on 011 375 5555 to log your complaints. If the matter is not resolved, send us the reference number and date it was logged, and Councillor Ravid will escalate it.

SAFETY AND SECURITY
Car theft is still our biggest crime problem. A recent investigation into the cost of a “community security project” yielded a quote in excess of R100,000 per month. This was deemed to be unaffordable. However it was agreed that such a project could be viable on a smaller scale, with perhaps a small number of neighbouring buildings sharing a focused and affordable service between them. North Road in Riviera and 9th Street in Killarney were mentioned as potentially viable project sites.
In the meanwhile, please ensure that your car doors are properly locked before you walk away from your vehicle, even if the lights have flashed and beeped as they normally do. We will be producing “warning signs” on this subject, to be made available to all buildings to put up in lobbies and lifts and garages.
Please continue to report all suspicious activity and individuals to Captain Moonsamy, on 071 675 6000.

HISTORICAL RECOGNITION
We have previously mentioned that any building having an appropriate heritage status can potentially qualify for a 20% rebate on their assessment rates.
Any building that is over 60 years of age might qualify, as well as any building which is deemed to have ‘‘cultural significance’’, meaning aesthetic, architectural, historical, scientific, social, spiritual, linguistic or technological value or significance. The other advantage of having a building declared as a Heritage Site is that no person may alter or demolish a protected part of the structure without a permit, whilst they will still be allowed to perform the kind of (internal) alterations that day to day living necessitates.
If your building potentially qualifies, there are experts living in Killarney who can help you to take the next step.

MORE TREES!
We thank Kayte Denham of Pam Golding Properties for the many new trees which they recently donated to buildings in the area. These new trees are helping to further improve the appearance and the value of our homes and streets. Many thanks Kayte!

Pavement and Pothole Repairs:
A number of pavements and streets have been repaired by the NKRA, in two projects. More repairs will be undertaken as soon as we have more funds available. If your building is not yet a contributing member, please appeal to your trustees to come to the party, and to help us to help you.

Trees are being pruned:
Our huge pavement and park trees are one of our suburb’s greatest assets, but they have not been pruned for many years, and big branches are starting to break off in strong winds. We have repeatedly begged for them to be pruned, and numerous promises have been made. Recently the giant acacia tree in the 4th Street Park, which was dangerously weakened by lightning, was finally topped off. However we wait in hope for the rest of the trees to be attended to.

Traffic Safety:
Following numerous requests from residents, we have applied for permission to build a traffic circle or a raised pedestrian crossing at the corner of 3rd Street and 2nd Ave, which has seen several quite serious accidents recently. This project will however require us to first obtain a traffic study, which will be seriously expensive – it will cost R14,000 just to find out if any traffic calming measures will even be allowed in 3rd Street. The community voted at our April public meeting to pay for the study, as the safety issues here are a serious concern. However our finances are now reaching parlous levels, and so we appeal to all buildings who have not contributed thusfar, please to consider making contributions so that we can continue to implement these kinds of projects, for the good of all our residents.

Complete Streets Initiative:
In the USA “complete streets” are roadways which are designed to be attractive, safe and accessible to motorists, cyclists and pedestrians. Proponents of complete streets policies claim that they improve safety, lower transportation costs, provide alternatives to private cars, encourage health through walking and cycling, create a sense of place, improve social interaction, and generally improve adjacent property values.
We are obviously constrained here in that it would not be possible to build bicycle lanes on pavements that are only two meters wide, and which are already strewn with poles and road-signs. However many of these “complete streets” ideas are already in place, such as:
• We already have pedestrian infrastructure such as sidewalks, raised crossings, wheelchair ramps and steep kerbs to keep cars on the road. We are fixing dangerous areas as best our finances allow.
• We have installed numerous traffic-calming measures to lower driving speeds, and more projects are in the pipeline.
• Our park is magnificent, and well looked after by the municipality (with lots of prodding).
• We are cleaning the streets ourselves, and planting replacement trees.
• Most buildings do look after their immediate environments.
You can read more about community projects at http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Complete_streets
Please let us have your suggestions.

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Our newsletters are kindly sponsored by Nomsa Nene Properties.

(NOMSA NENE ESTATE AGENT (CRS) (PDE) (NQL4)(RPL) SECTIONAL TITLE SPECIALIST)
Email: Nomsa@neneprop.co.za I Website: www.neneprop.co.za | Fax to email: 086 617 4662
Office tell: 011 486 0569 I Office fax: 011 486 4698 I Mobile: 083 964 2665 4662