ROUND-TABLE discussions, plenary sessions, debates, launches and fun activities will characterise the week themed Liveable Cities, which starts at the Emoyeni Centre in Parktown on Wednesday, 10 August.
Ruby Mathang, the City’s portfolio head of development planning and urban management, will open Liveable Cities with a plenary session on the day and architects, urban planners and City officials in the urban planning and development field will participate.
Four rotating breakaway discussion sessions on Growth and Development Strategy (GDS) challenges and future solutions related to living space and shelter, public environment, activities and facilities, mobility and accessibility and infrastructure will also be held. The GDS is the City’s business plan
“Select stakeholders will begin by raising questions, sharing Joburg’s positive attributes and limitations and addressing the challenges faced by Johannesburg in the liveability stakes,” said Gaynor Mashamaite-Noyce, Joburg’s deputy director of communications.
Cosmo City
On the same day in Cosmo City, northwest of the metro, Executive Mayor Parks Tau will facilitate the opening of an early childhood development centre “which embodies the spirit of the liveable cities theme in celebrating a private-public partnership initiative”.
“The City’s Human Development agenda identified the Early Childhood Development programme as a key intervention strategy aimed at dealing with inter-generational poverty, which spurred the City to provide and facilitate access to proper and well-equipped ECD infrastructure in deprived communities,” Mashamaite-Noyce explained.
The day will conclude with an evening cocktail party and a presentation on future perspectives for the city, to be preceded by a formal address from the mayor. Outcomes and discussions will be recorded as part of the public interaction programme and discussed by a panel of experts on Friday, August 12, she said.
Amazing Race
Mashamaite-Noyce noted that Thursday, 11 August would be about putting Joburg’s liveability to the test. About six teams will compete in a simulated amazing race around Parktown and Soweto. “This Amazing Race concept is called Jozi Mojo,” she said.
As part of the game, participants comprising the youth, people with disabilities, media personnel, social housing residents and Joburg’s soccer legends would be required to solve clues, visit different places and negotiate their way to a series of mystery landmarks, said Mashamaite-Noyce.
She said events and experiences of the day will be filmed and viewed at the Friday, 12 August panel discussions at the Emoyeni Centre. “Findings from the first day’s deliberations will be presented before a panel of experts who will contribute their views on long-term growth scenarios and mechanisms,” she said.
Panellists for the day include former Joburg executive Professor Phil Harrison, Wits University’s chair of development planning and modelling and the member of South Africa’s National Planning Commission, Professor Edgar Pieterse from the African Centre for Cities based at the University of Cape Town and Richard Holden, an architect renowned for his work on the City’s Energy Efficiency Guidelines for Buildings.
Attwell Gardens Park
In line with the concept of Liveable Cities, Mashamaite-Noyce said two significant launches related to positive developments in the inner city will take place on Saturday, 13 August. The first one is the opening of the Attwell Gardens Park in the inner city and a R50-million Joshco social housing project in Berea.
“The upgrade showcases the City of Johannesburg’s efforts in embracing its role and commitment to the inner city’s ongoing regeneration efforts,” she said.
In the next nine weeks, discussions on the GDS process will be centred on water shortages, climate change, affordable energy supply, inequality, pollution, conservation, economic development, infrastructure, urbanisation, investment, transport and other numerous topics of sustainability and technology.
Speaking at the launch of the GDS 2040 process at Turbine Hall in Newtown on Tuesday, 2 August Tau urged all Joburgers to get involved as this was a platform to discuss challenges confronting the City and prospective solutions. “We want to have a conversation about how we create an integrated city,” he said.
“We want to have a conversation about how we can create an integrated city. How do we become part of a city that is liveable? We want to talk about resource sustainability, we must have a discussion about waste management and we want to talk about health and poverty, so we are raising these issues to the people of Johannesburg to say we request you to participate through all forms available so that we can say we have collectively agreed on the growth and development strategy of Johannesburg.”
The GDS charts prospects of the next five-year political term. It was first drafted in 2006 and is currently being reviewed to ensure its objectives and guidelines meet the “needs of a dynamic urban environment”, said Tau.
Members of the public can join the conversation on Joburg’s future on the microsite, Facebook, Twitter, YouTube at suggestion boxes at regional offices across all regions or by email gds2040@gmail.com.
Source: Joburg.org.za