By
Lucille Davie
TIRED of the noise of lawnmowers, worries about security, your neighbour's
screaming brats, and parents yelling at their children, in the suburbs?
Try this: move back into the city centre, where you don't need house
insurance, burglar guards or alarms, you can close your door only when
you go to bed, your neighbours are friendly, and when you walk to your car,
people in the street stop and chat.
That's what Susan Gillam says. She should know - she moved back into Johannesburg's city centre six months ago and loves it. She lives on the rooftop floor - the 20th floor - of Ansteys Towers, an Art Deco building and national monument: "I feel like I am living in Manhattan in Africa," she says.
"I am not a family person or a baby maker, I live on my own and travel a
lot," she adds. And surprisingly, she works in the northern suburbs.
She is so enthusiastic about the idea that she wants to get other people to
come and live on the rooftops of Johannesburg's inner city buildings.
"While I was sitting looking out over Johannesburg's tall buildings, I
noticed lots of empty office blocks with vacant top floors, so I wondered
about getting people to move into these wonderful spaces."
The result was Rooftops for Africa, an agency for finding people to move
into these flats. Gillam intends contacting the owners of the buildings, and
through the Rooftops for Africa website, getting tenants and owners together
to fill the spaces.
And the rentals for these rooftop flats? On a par with what you would pay in Killarney or Sandton, says Gillam.
Together with a fellow rooftop dweller, Richard Yell, who lives several blocks away in Anchor Towers, Gillam has plans to green the inner city, by identifying abandoned buildings and suggesting to the city council that they be demolished to create parks. "This was done in Sweden, and worked very well."
Both Gillam and Yell have potted gardens on their rooftops. Yell has experimented with various containers and has established several large plastic pots in which he grows vegetables on his rooftop.
"I order 20-30 bags of potting soil at a time - quite a thing to bring that lot upstairs," he says.
Yell moved up from Durban a year ago, and moved into his flat, a converted servants' quarters. He calls himself an independent inner city promoter and works with the city council. "I hope to bring middle and high income earners back into the city," he says. He, like Gillam, works in the northern suburbs, and is "having a ball" in the inner city. "It is a peaceful, beautiful place."
No shopping malls for Gillam. "I have all the usual shops - Woolworths,
Game, Edgars - just around the corner. But I also have an amazing mix of
shops nearby too - clothing and things for the home."
And crime? In the six months Gillam has been in the city centre, there has
been a marked drop in crime - some 50% - since closed circuit cameras were
installed. "You are more likely to get mugged or have your car hijacked in the suburbs," she says.
Gillam spends the evenings watching the sunset, and enjoys "the moon glistening off the buildings, especially the glass buildings".
"You must see the atmosphere at night, there is a quietness, and an
aliveness in the people - you can feel the warmth of the African people. And
the lights are wonderful."
She gets unusual visitors too: "Helicopters come over, and then turn around
and come back for a second look."
