THE City of Cape Town’s Human Settlements Directorate held an open day to discuss plans for a new social housing project in the Lansdowne area that will add value to the area.
The mayoral committee member for human settlements, councillor Carl Pophaim, and human settlements teams provided the community with the information and updates about the planned project.
“We were pleased to share the important updates and feedback about the proposed development concept, the property disposal processes currently in progress and all the required statutory applications that are to be undertaken in the following months,” said Pophaim.
“Our teams will keep residents informed as we make more progress. We also emphasised how important these developments are to provide access to more affordable rental opportunities in all urban centres in the metro for those earning between R1 850 and R22 000 per month as well as the great benefit it holds to invigorate and improve neighbourhoods,” he added.
“The proposed affordable housing development will yield approximately 308 social housing opportunities for qualifying beneficiaries. We are excited to get the ball rolling so that we can assist more beneficiaries in future.”
He said, “Social Housing plays a critical role in addressing housing affordability and provides safe, decent and affordable housing opportunities for families in the city. A lot of the City’s actions seek to make affordable housing projects more feasible for private sector partners by offering development packaging, land discounts and leveraging municipal land to make projects more viable for private sector partners.”
Pophaim said over the past year, through the Accelerated Land Release Programme, which is a Mayoral Priority, the city has been making significant interventions in the market.
It is yielding results with an estimated affordable housing pipeline on well-located land in and near urban centres of up to 10 000 units under way.
“This is besides Breaking New Ground housing, informal settlement and backyarder upgrades and land reform through title deeds and upgrading of the public housing units that we are focused on.”
Pophaim said the city was making steady progress around the metro and it was glad to have already assisted thousands of families at the various developments in the city, including Maitland Mews, the Anchorage in Glenhaven, Bothasig Gardens, Goodwood Station, and the Western Cape Government’s Conradie Park development in Pinelands.