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Blessings Chidakwa

Municipal Reporter

Many of the major roads in Harare that had fallen into serious disrepair have now been fixed by the emergency programme delivered by the central Government.

While municipalities such as Harare City Council are supposed to be maintaining their own road networks, last year Harare managed to rehabilitate just 1,1km against its own target of 120km, and did very little other maintenance, so roads continued to fall into disrepair with major potholes and washaways becoming common.

So the Government had to declare urban roads a national emergency, giving it the legal right to step in with its Emergency Road Rehabilitation Programme.

Major road works continue but already there a many stretches where work has now finished. The once potholed busy Ardbernnie Road in the industrial sites linking Seke Road to Mbare is among the roads that have been fully repaired and then resurfaced with road markings completed.

A traffic intersection linking the road with Seke Road was also spruced up as the Government moves with pace on infrastructural development in line with attaining vision 2030. 

On Pangula Road (Chikurubi Prison Access), 3,2km have been completed and surfaced while there is also progress along Robert Mugabe Road including road resurfacing and shoulder widening, road markings, construction of bus stops and repainting of street lights.

Repairs have gone further than just filling potholes and covering these with new tar. 

The repair teams deployed by Government did the job properly, cutting out the pothole, refilling and compacting with the correct layers that support the road, and then resurfacing, either the rectangular repair or the whole stretch of highway if the bitumen and stone surface was crumbling. 

These sort of repairs usually last a lot longer than those where some clay is rammed into a hole and the top covered, without the underlying weakness also fixed.

Mazowe Street pothole patching and drainage clearance is also complete with shoulder widening ongoing.

Tree pruning and grass cutting around Parirenyatwa Hospital is also underway with road shoulder widening around UZ Medical School also ongoing.

Cranborne Avenue is also in progress along with the main road that connects the five Budiriro suburbs.

In Highfield, the pothole patching and drainage clearing works on Main Street road from Willowvale Road to High Glen has been completed while resealing, road markings and repairing of streets lights will be commenced soon. 

Permanent Secretary in the Ministry of Information, Publicity and Broadcasting Services Mr Nick Mangwana posting on his twitter handle said the road rehabilitation programme was also contributing to employment creation.

“Transport and Infrastructural Development contracted CMED to rehabilitate the 2,9km stretch from Joshua Nkomo Road (the airport road) roundabout up to Boshoff Road through Prospect. 

“Thirty local people have been employed and 10 are women. They expect to be done by August 16,” he said.