The parking area in front of the Key West apartment blocks in Milnerton was recently cleared of abandoned vehicles and vagrants sleeping in tents, an issue the residents and the local ward councillor had been battling for years.
Before the area was cleaned the stench of urine and faeces was overwhelming, Ward 55 councillor Fabian Ah-Sing said.
“It comes on for many years now . . . even before covid. We have people using the parking lot to park their vehicles and live in their vehicles and tents.”
A bylaw was then enforced where traffic services tag suspected abandoned vehicles suspected.
These cars are then monitored for seven days.
“If on the seventh day if it has not moved the car will be impounded. If someone wants to claim their vehicle back they need to pay a fine. More people came with their cars and tents during Covid and stayed in the parking lot,” Ah-Sing said.
Ah-Sing told TygerBurger vagrants use the parking bays to set their tents up with no ablution facilities.
“The area is not made and designed for that,” he said. “So the area had a really bad stench and also a mess was created by littering everywhere. They throw their waste into the bushes.”
Solutions
During the cleaning joint operation by the social development department and the cleansing department recently Ah-Sing said there was not a spot where the vagrants had not dumped waste.
“The parking lot is in such a state that it becomes unusable to anyone else, and that is unfair. It goes against our bylaws.”
Residents also raised the alarm on the stench and illegal activities taking place in the parking lot.
“It always looked like they were throwing a party there,” a resident said.
Ah-Sing said a lot of work goes into organising a joint operation to clean the area.
“It looks much better but needs more interventions. We also try to help them by informing them of all the City initiatives there is available for the homeless so they can have a place to sleep and get a warm meal. I constantly engage with them to seek help. Most are not ready to ask or seek out help,” he says.
Ah-Sing has since urged residents to not give hand-outs at robots and to rather give responsibly via the City’s campaign.
