New shopping centre on cards

CAPE Town’s upmarket suburb of Constantia is poised to get a new shopping centre and two traffic circles.

Officials have recommended that development of the R250million shopping centre should go ahead on land that was at the centre of a restitution battle.

One of the traffic circles – at the junction of Ladies Mile and Spaanschemat River roads – will have a new road into the centre’s 427 parking bays.

The Solomon families farmed the 14 581m² from 1902 until they were removed in 1967 under the Group Areas Act.

By the time they left, the land had an 11roomed Victorianstyle house, a sevenroomed colonial-style house, eight family houses and workers’ cottages and outbuildings.

Now it is empty, but councillors are poised to give the go-ahead for a three-storey shopping centre, anchored by a Shoprite- Checkers supermarket, when they meet tomorrow.

Fifty-four objections to the development were sent to the City of Cape Town, claiming it would harm the character of the prosperous suburb, compromise traffic safety and pay little respect to the site’s history.

But the Solomon families said their plan was “socially just and empowering, and in line with [our] constitutional entitlement to restitution of land use rights.

“The families will celebrate their memories and heritage in the redevelopment of their land.”

The leasing of the shopping centre, which borders the M3, will cross-subsidise the families’ residential development on the other side of the road.

The second new traffic circle the City of Cape Town plans for Constantia will replace traffic lights at the junction of Ladies Mile and Huxley roads.