Now that the City of Cape Town and the Provincial Government have secured the development of the River Club, without ever having to answer in the High Court for their unlawful decisions, their attention is now focused on destroying other green space in the Two Rivers Urban Park.

The Department of Infrastructure, part of the Western Cape government, has proposed a dense mixed use development at the Oude Molen site in Cape Town, currently housing a thriving ecovillage that was nominated as part of the City of Cape Town’s successful bid for Design Capital of the World in 2014. Oude Molen Village is a part of the Wider Two Rivers Urban Park currently being assessed by the South African Heritage Resources Agency (SAHRA) for grade 1  (National) heritage status and is a key green space in the urban metropole.

The development aims to put more than 100 000 square metres of bulk onto the 14 hectare Oude Molen site which a vibrant ecovillage, described in the baseline heritage study as a “mosaic of precincts at the confluence of two rivers that celebrates complex layers of memory, culturaI heritage, science and diversity and supports healing, environmental resilience, promotes spatial integration, and urban intensification within an efficient mobility network”. The area has, as a Cape Talk investigation shows, a long and layered history  including use by indigenous Khoi groups and the imprisonment of a Zulu king by British colonists. 

The proposals from the Provincial Government effectively ignore the uniqueness of the site that currently supports around 30 to 40 small enterprises, employing approximately 500 individuals and attracting up to 1000 visitors/day. Additionally,  there are two schools, a care facility for the aged and persons with disability, urban agriculture, a stable with 42 horses, many of them rescued, that provides riding lessons and therapeutic programmes for persons of all ages, contributing to both local wellness and tourism. Rather than recognising this ecovillage as a vibrant contributor to the City’s economy and protector of the unique sense of place, we are again facing the approach from the authorities of top-down decisions driving development at all costs. 

In fact, the Heritage Impact Assessment (HIA) for the development was twice rejected by Heritage Western Cape for its failure to map the intangible heritage of Oude Molen. Rather than undertake a proper inventory and assessment of living heritage, the provincial government, went straight to appeal the HWC decision. Earlier this month, the HWC Appeal Committee dismissed the appeal and upheld the decision by HWC to reject the HIA. 

Their reasons were simple:  

The Appeal Committee confirmed “the site constitutes a cohesive, complex and layered cultural landscape in which built, natural and social components are interdependent” and that the “HIA does not adequately assess this cultural landscape or the relationships between its constituent elements. The analysis is fragmented and does not sufficiently address the spatial, ecological and social characteristics that contribute to the site’s heritage significance and sense of place.”

Despite this, the Provincial Government is proceeding without delay to seek rezoning of the site to enable the development to proceed.  It is unclear whether they will pause for a moment to address the patent insufficiency of their application from the perspective of living heritage.

A call has been issued on Dear South Africa for people to register their objection to the rezoning application which you can do at this link. 

The Observatory Civic Association has opposed the development along with many of the Ecovillage residents and small business, various Interested and Affected Parties and wider communities across Cape Town. There is no justice to be achieved by misusing claims of redress of past injustice to inflict a development model that is patently unfair and unjust.

The comments of one Interested and Affected Party makes this point abundantly clear: “I object to any changes to Ode Molen Precinct. I am Capetonian, from Khoi/Malay ethnicity. We are losing way too much to developments in a City that should be preserving our heritage. Tourists flood our city to come and experience it, yet those in charge short-sightedly are willing to give it up … The City might not treasure preservation of culture, but here, we were told painful stories of being chucked out of Claremont and District Six, it is humiliating that we have parents dying before benefitting from land restitution. Go develop somewhere else, we love Oude Molen and the little reminder of our roots.”

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