October 13, 2004
By Ndaba Dlamini
WORK on the Brickfields housing development in Newtown, a Johannesburg Housing Company initiative, is well underway and the project is set to be finished by April 2005.
Mayor Amos Masondo with city officials during a tour of the housing project
Addressing the executive mayor of Johannesburg, Amos Masondo, and his entourage during a Region 8 mayoral road show recently, Johannesburg Housing Company development manager Anton Gollub said construction of the first phase of the project consists of 536 mixed-income rental residential units.
"This remarkable development will also provide retail facilities to serve people who will occupy these units when complete."
The residential units will consist of one to three bed-roomed flats. The units will cater for people in the lower, middle and high-income groups and rental costs of the flats will range from R1 100 to R1 800, according to Johannesburg Housing Company's Dombolo Masilela.
The project will see high-rise blocks of between eight and 12 storeys interspersed by low rise buildings rising up to grace Joburg skies. The open space adjacent to the site will be developed in the next phase of the project, according to Gollub.
The Johannesburg Housing Company, established in 1995, has invested R112-million in 1 756 housing units within the inner city, R22-million of that in the form of direct housing subsidies. The company has, in the process, added five percent to the present housing stock of the city.
The Brickfields housing development is the biggest public/private partnership in a social housing and residential project in the country, the first such upward residential development in the inner city in 30 years.
"The project will cost about R120-million when finished. Funding for the project came from the National Housing Finance Corporation, Johannesburg Housing Company and the Gauteng province provided 30 percent of the initial capital through the Gauteng Partnership Fund and the Gauteng Department of Housing," said Gollub.
The private sector, on the other hand, chipped in with millions of rands through Anglo American, Absa and AngloGold to make the project a success.
"The construction of the residential units will certainly have social impacts. Creches, which form part of the developments, will be put up to cater for children living in the complex together with support services like information technology rooms," Gollub added.
Situated just below the Mandela Bridge, the housing development is located in one of Johannesburg's historic sites. Brickfields was established in the 1880s, an area which was rich in clay. Brick making became the most popular form of generating income in the area and by 1896, about 7 000 people of all races lived in the Brickfields area, later named Burghersdorp.
Since the land was close to the Johannesburg city centre and the railway line, many businesses and immigrants coming from overseas bought stands in Burghersdorp. Soon, trading companies, banks, brick companies, a brewery, and fisheries moved into the area. Many Indians also set up shops and eateries in Brickfields.
In April 1904, the area was set alight by the fire brigade destroying everything in the inferno - a measure to combat the bubonic plague that had broken out. The area was surveyed, re-planned and renamed Newtown by October 1904. Today, Brickfields has become part of the Newtown Cultural Precinct, an area synonymous with the heritage and culture of South Africa and especially Johannesburg.
"To mark more than 100 years of development, plans are in the pipeline to stage a Brickfields exhibition to showcase developments that have taken place in this area since its establishment in the turn of the century," Gollub said.
An old horseshoe found at the Brickfields housing development site and framed pictures of developments in Brickfields since the 1880s were presented to Masondo by the Johannesburg Housing Company.
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