THE PROJECT

 

The City of Cape Town is responsible for undertaking the routine management and maintenance of Cape Town’s numerous rivers, canals, vleis, wetlands, estuaries and constructed stormwater systems to ensure public safety, manage flood risk, promote habitat and biotic diversity and prevent or minimise infrastructure damage. The CCT undertakes these activities on a routine, repetitive basis throughout its jurisdictional area. All of these interventions are intended to keep the City’s stormwater system functioning at an optimal level whilst maintaining and in some cases improving ecosystem health through rehabilitation of degraded systems. Many of these stormwater maintenance and management measures require authorisation in terms of environmental legislation.

 

An application for environmental authorisation of the City’s stormwater maintenance programme was duly submitted to DEA&DP in 2012. Environmental authorisation was issued on 13 February 2015. The environmental authorisation however excluded any stormwater maintenance and management activities within estuaries. The reason given by DEA&DP for excluding estuaries from the authorisation was a lack of sufficient information and detail for each estuary or river mouth.

 

Estuaries are an integral component of the City’s catchments and are a functional part of the surface stormwater system. The outlets of river systems in Cape Town, whether estuaries or river mouths, are located in developed areas with significant existing private and municipal infrastructure which must be protected from damage that could arise due to high natural and urban stormwater flows originating within the upstream contributing catchment areas. Management of estuaries is therefore essential to ensure the stormwater system functions correctly.

 

City of Cape Town therefore submitted an amendment application to apply for maintenance and management activities within estuaries to be authorised and included in the environmental authorisation.

 The amendment application has been approved. A copy of the amended environmental authorisation is available in the section below.

 

Queries related to the project can be directed to GIBB using the contact details below.

 

GIBB Public Participation Office

 

Ms Kate Parkinson

Address:                 PO Box 63703, Greenacres, Port Elizabeth, 6057               Fax:         041 363 9300

Tel:                          +27 41 392 7500 (09h00 to 16h00)                                       Email:      cctstormwatereia@gibb.co.za

 

Should you require further information, please do not hesitate to contact us.

PROPOSED CITY OF CAPE TOWN SURFACE STORMWATER

ENVIRONMENTAL IMPACT ASSESSMENT

(DEA&DP REF NO:16/3/1/3/1/A7/4/2031/12, EXEMPTION REF NO: 16/3/1/4/A7/4/2013/12)

 

The City of Cape Town is responsible for undertaking the routine management and maintenance of Cape Town’s numerous rivers, canals, vleis, wetlands, estuaries and constructed stormwater systems to ensure public safety, manage flood risk, promote habitat and biotic diversity and prevent or minimise infrastructure damage. The CCT undertakes these activities on a routine, repetitive basis throughout its jurisdictional area. All of these interventions are intended to keep the City’s stormwater system functioning at an optimal level whilst maintaining and in some cases improving ecosystem health through rehabilitation of degraded systems.

 

Some of these interventions trigger the EIA Regulations (2010) in so far as they are regarded as being “listed activities” and hence require authorisation by the Department of Environmental Affairs and Development Planning (DEA&DP).  The DEA&DP has advised CCT that due to changes in national legislation, the existing authorisation, obtained in 2000 under the Environment Conservation Act (Act No. 73 of 1989), needs to be re-applied for in terms of the current National Environmental Management Act (Act No. 107 of 1998), and its associated 2010 EIA Regulations. 

  

Public Participation Process

 

The interested and affected party (I&AP) registration process for the project ran from 6 September 2012 - 05 October 2012. The registration process for the project is now closed.

 

I&AP Commenting Period

 

The I&AP commenting period for the project is now closed.

 

The draft basic assessment report was released for a forty (40) day commenting period from 22 January - 3 March 2014. The final basic assessment report was made available for review for a period of twenty one (21) days from  13 October 2014 - 03 November 2014.  The public review period for the final basic assessment report has now closed. Comments received during this period have been captured in the comments and response report and the environmental assessment practitioner has responded to these comments. The comments and response report is available for review in the section below. The final basic assessment report has been submitted to DEA&DP and environmental authorization was granted on 13 February 2015.

For further information, the person below can be contacted during office hours. 

  

 CCT Surface Stormwater Public Participation Office

Ms Kate Parkinson

Address:           PO Box 63703, Greenacres, Port Elizabeth, 6057

Tel:                   041 392 7500

Fax:                  041 363 9300

Email:               cctstormwatereia@gibb.co.za

  

The CCT Surface Stormwater Public Participation Office is open during office hours from 09:00 - 16:00 Monday to Friday, excluding Public Holidays