‘Clean up this sand’ supplier told
VEREENIGING. – Proudly Three Rivers, an organisation commited to repairing the suburb of Three Rivers’ deteriorating infrastructure, has made an appeal to local sand products supplier Sky Sands and their haulers to clean up the mess left behind in the suburb.
Photographs published on social media last week shows the extent to which roads have been covered by sand left behind by haulers. The trucks transport the sand from Sky Sands’ premises at Panfontein to other areas. According to Riaan van der Merwe, a member of the Proudly Three Rivers committee, trucks transporting wet sand are not covered as per regulation – some of them using shade netting an excuse for tarpaulins – and ad to the problem of sand spillage along roads such as Blackwood Street and Houtkopweg.
One of the results of this is that storm water drains are now blocked with sand, causing even more damage to roads in the suburb. Van der Merwe says the organisation has been in contact with Sky Sands and asked them to clean up the mess.
“Numerous requests have yielded no results, and our team now have to clean up. We would much rather spend our efforts in fixing roads, sidewalks and parks,” van der Merwe told Ster North. But Peet Herbst, a manager at Sky Sands, says although the company supplies sand to over 200 customers it has no control over the trucks used by those customers. “Those are not Sky Sands’ trucks,” Herbst says. He used the example of a shopper going to a supermarket and dumping the plastic bag along a road. “It is not the supermarket that dumps the plastic but rather the shopper.
It is the same with the sand. We have no control over the trucks that leave our premises,” Herbst explained. He suggested that traffic authorities from Emfuleni Local Municipality and Midvaal Local Municipality should get involved and fine the perpetrators that spill sand on the roads.
