We had our first meeting on Thursday 7 September 2022 to inform interested residents about the Brandwacht Farm 1049/3 re-zoning application. Thank you to Rhenish High for providing us with the Ebenezer Hall.
About 40 interested residents attended the meeting chaired by Emma and Raine.
Meeting started with our councillor Esther Groenewald, who described the roadmap from application to final decision making within the Municipality. She emphasised the importance of familiarising and understanding all municipal policies (which will be posted soon). The councillor mentioned that the application makes provision for up to 1000 households. She further described how a submission for objections needs to be focused around the principles of the spacial development framework (SDF) The application mentions the proposed eastern link road. (ELR) A great deal of discussion centred about the legal status of the ELR proposal and the municipality’s stance on this. ELR has been part of municipal planning since 1960s. However according to council there are no concrete plans to pursue. However it still appears in municipal policy as according to residents it has recently been incorporated into the Comprehensive Integrated Transport Plan. This is an issue that needs clarification.
Action points
1. All residents are advices to submit individual objections
2. Subcommittee to facilitate joint submission.
2.1 Draft to be circulated for comments
2.2 Street reps to be appointed to obtain signatures
2.3 Submission to be submitted by informal group of residents (inclusive of any Stellenbosch resident or interested party)
2.4 If necessary, NPO to be formed if and when legal action is taken (for costs reasons)
3. Subcommittee to obtain further information and documents on the status of the ELR.
4. Subcommittee to set up website/drop box for information sharing where relevant docs will be available.
We are working to set up the subcommittee and action groups and will get back to you with names and contact details for each task.
In the meantime pls spread the word and inform your neighbors and residents in other suburbs about the application and it’s implication for the larger Stellenbosch.
We have followed up with Esther regarding dates for submission.