April 13, 2004
By Ndaba Dlamini
FOR Rockey/Raleigh street, the hub of cosmopolitan Yeoville, Sunday morning is as active as any other and the Johannesburg Development Agency's development strategies will ensure a dynamic shopping, entertainment and recreation centre is created and maintained for its residents.
Part of flatland (the term given to the Hillbrow, Berea and Yeoville areas because of the plethora of high-rise flats), Yeoville has, since the late 1990s, seen a huge increase in residents, a large number of which are immigrants.
A product of an early experiment by the post-apartheid city government to remove informal traders from the streets and provide formal market facilities for hawkers, Rockey Street Market at the end of Raleigh Road is a combination of African barter-style trading and western consumerism.
Vendor stalls are brimful with an assortment of foods ranging from dried beans to ground nuts, clothing and beadwork from all the corners of the African continent. The smell of seasoned fish is strong and a restaurant catering for a variety of immigrant cuisines form the basis of a "museum of immigration" conceptualised by executive committee member of the Yeoville Community Policing Forum (YCPF), Karl von Holdt.
If you're into cuisine from Limpopo, MaMulaudzi, a Tsonga vendor specialising in Venda and Tsonga delicacies, is sure to satisfy with masonja (mopani worms) at R5 a packet. If you're from Goma, you can be assured of getting fufu (cassava pap), or ngai-ngai (vegetable soup) and saka saka (cassava leaves) from Jasmine from the Congo.
Business is brisk and competition tight, and the Shoprite and the Yeoville Hyper Market across the street find it difficult to keep up with the versatile market proprietors, who sell goods much cheaper than the supermarkets.
Under the roof of the market, hair salons, barbershops, cellphone repair shops, fast food stalls and clothing outlets vie for space with hawkers who sell watches and travelling bags as cheap as R15.
In addition to the market, the Johannesburg Development Agency's (JDA) regeneration plan, welcomed by the YCPF, a partnership between the Yeoville community and the South African Police Service, identified different zones for different activities along the length of Rockey/Raleigh Street.
This strategy sees the section from Fortesque to Kenmere streets being zoned as a civic node with a focus on public services, and a bigger library is on the cards. The present library, improvised from an old house, can accommodate only a few readers at a time and, according to the YCPF, expansion is possible by either taking over the house next to the library in Bedford Street or by taking over the old Standard Bank building next to it in Raleigh Street. The public pool, also built to cater for a small community, will be upgraded to meet current demands.
An ambitious part of the plan is the establishment of a computer clubhouse for the youth, possibly at the recreation centre. The recreation centre, situated next to the park, is to be upgraded with a well-developed TV/video/newspaper room where documentaries and movies can be accessed and life skills taught. The building of a public information centre has also been proposed to cater for tourists.
At a public meeting held between the JDA and Yeoville residents at the end of March, Von Holdt envisaged an arts and craft centre being set up in the old tram shed opposite the Yeoville recreation centre which would double up as a "museum of immigration". The "museum of immigration", according to Von Holdt, would capture Yeoville's "historic and continuing role as a destination for immigrants into Johannesburg - comparing the experience, for instance, of a young revolutionary Joe Slovo (anti-apartheid firebrand and member of the African National Congress, who arrived as an eight-year-old, an immigrant from Lithuania) and of today's refugees from Zimbabwe, Democratic Republic of Congo, and so on with stories, videos, pictures dedicated to exploring cultural tensions and overcoming xenophobia".
A central rendezvous point for friends and relatives from the Yoruba in Kenya to Pakistanis in the Middle East, Yeoville is a home-away-from-home for immigrant residents, and Time Square, located at the corner of Fortesque and Raleigh streets, is a hot hangout. Housing an entertainment centre, which consists of a nightclub, restaurants and bars, recording studios, hair salons and medical services, Time Square is a popular draw-card for tourists.
Further down Rockey/Raleigh street between Cavendish and Bezuidenhout Streets, the adult entertainment section of Yeoville cooks with Congolese bars and 24-hour nightclubs for those hooked on high living.
In light of the huge numbers of people the entertainment centres attract, security measures will be stepped up and improved lighting and CCTV cameras have been proposed for the YCPF identified crime spots along Rockey and Raleigh as well as Hunter and Hopkins streets.
Crackdowns on by-law infringements such as the unlawful sale of reduced-rate fresh produce on pavements will be enforced by the YCPF, who also feel liquor and liquor licences need to be strictly policed.
On a more practical level, traffic regulation and paving of Rockey and Raleigh and some of the adjacent streets is also in the pipeline. The JDA plan hopes to turn the Rockey Street one-way section between De La Rey and Bezuidenhout streets into a two-way street to alleviate congestion along the proposed M18 route, along Observatory-Rockey-Bezuidenhout-Hendon-Harrow.
As a token of its commitment to the regeneration strategy, the Yeoville community has accepted a proposal from the JDA to establish a Yeoville Development Forum, which will provide ongoing consultation and liaison over the development of the hub at the social centre of the African universe.
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