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Municipal Reporter
Harare City Council is set to create economic hubs at bus termini under construction across the city and in residential areas, as it moves to decongest the Central Business District and lay the foundation for sustainable vending and commuter omnibus operations. Acting town clerk Mrs Josephine Ncube yesterday said several investors had taken up the city’s offer and plans were afoot to build shops and supermarkets at bus termini, while the city had also procured tents for informal traders who were being moved from the CBD. “We will be having small shops that are going to be opening from these areas,” she said.

“We are expanding the economic hub from the CBD to other areas. Remember, we also want shopping malls in all residential areas so that people do not travel to the city centre to access such facilities. We are happy with the response we are getting for such developments. In the CBD, we have had a good response, a number of business owners are already partitioning buildings to accommodate vendors who are on the streets. We are sure that our re-planning exercise of the city is proceeding according to plan. CBZ currently finalising the plan.”

Mrs Ncube said Coventry Bus terminus, which is one of the several under construction for the purpose, was being serviced and being extended to accommodate buses coming from the western side of the city and kombis. She said the buses and kombis will park there, dropping passengers, while shuttles will carry people into the city.

“We are very happy with the progress because after the servicing, the next stage is to put the cabbing and once that is in place, we will be able to operate,” said Mrs Ncube.

“We will be expanding the ablution facilities as you can see we already have such facilities, but we will be expanding them. We will be having vendors on the other side of the termini. We will be surfacing the area for the purposes of vending, which will not take a lot of time and by next week, the place would be properly surfaced and we will be putting in the tents which we have already purchased.”

Mrs Ncube said work was in progress to service other areas, with areas like Cripps and Seke Road being serviced in phases. She said the city intended to meet its timeline to start operations before the end of the year. “In respect of vending, the 38 tents that we have purchased are intended to be a stop gap measure,” she said.

“Our medium term plan is to come up with modern vending facilities. The first one will be built by one of our partners CBZ at the corner of Cripps and Seke,” she said.

“We have other sites as well, where we are working with partners and we are still in negotiation. They are going to put additional infrastructure for our informal sector.”