Motorists travelling through Lansdowne and Hanover Park areas should brace themselves for traffic jams as early as this weekend, as the City prepares for the construction of Cape Town’s first Sky Circle, set to commence later this month, reports Cape {town} Etc.
In preparation for construction, the City announced that the signalised intersection at Govan Mbeki Road (M9) and Jan Smuts Drive (M17) in Lansdowne will be converted into a temporary traffic circle this weekend.
As a result, lane closures and traffic delays will be in effect from 1pm on Saturday, 15 March, until 5pm on Sunday, 16 March. Thereafter, motorists will enter the intersection through a traffic circle, which will be in place until the building work on the Sky Circle has been completed.
A huge crane will also be installed in the middle of the traffic circle; thus, if possible, road users are advised to avoid this intersection completely over the coming weekend.
Additionally, a temporary steel bridge will be installed over the northbound carriageway of Jan Smuts Drive to provide a safe passage for construction workers. The height restriction will be 4.3 metres and will be in place for the duration of the Sky Circle’s construction.
The City advised that the project is estimated to take approximately 18 months.
The freestanding elevated Sky Circle – the first of its kind in the country – in Lansdowne forms part of the City’s MyCiTi bus service expansion and plans to connect Mitchells Plain, Khayelitsha and various other communities across the metro-southeast with Wynberg and Claremont.
The City also confirmed that once the overhead construction of the Sky Circle has been completed, the signalised intersection will be reinstated.
The traffic announcement follows just after a transport analysis of the Foreshore Freeway Precinct by the City’s urban mobility directorate revealed that the existing freeway viaducts carry up to 7 000 vehicles per hour in both directions during morning and afternoon peak periods, which IOL reported on.
The transport analysis forms part of a larger scoping study aimed at developing an integrated transport and land use solution to tackle Cape Town’s current congestion crisis.
Meanwhile, traffic delays and congestion are also expected in and around the Green Point area this weekend as road closures come into effect in preparation for the highly anticipated Cape Town Carnival set to take place on Saturday evening.
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Picture: City of Cape Town
