With Management Company Out, Stadium's Future is Uncertain in Cape Town

The city of Cape Town had justified the major expense it was taking on to build the brand new Green Point Stadium for the 2010 World Cup by pointing to the fact that it had contracted a management group to make sure the stadium remained in use and pulled in revenue. But now that company has pulled out and the city's $639 million stadium is treading towards white elephant territory.

Capetonians are divided over whether the stadium is an elegant icon or a useless monument to South Africa’s excessive spending on the World Cup. Other stadiums – such as the 45,000-seater Mbombela stadium in Nelspruit, which cost R1.3bn (€134m), and the Peter Mokaba stadium in Polokwane (cost: R1.25m) were always expected to become white elephants. But Cape Town’s stylish stadium was the most expensive of the 10 World Cup venues, leading everyone to believe that the number crunchers considered it sustainable.

The empty stadiums: South Africa’s white elephants
Monocle
October 21, 2010

Cape Town Fan Walk Likely Here to Stay

Officials in Cape Town are planning to keep the Fan Walk pedestrianized link between the Green Point Stadium and the central business district as an ongoing public amenity. The Fan Walk will be closed to traffic during large events at the stadium.

Beach Road in Sea Point could also be "vehicle-free" on weekends if a plan by local ward councillor JP Smith gets the go-ahead from residents and the council.

Smith said the fan walk would most probably be a permanent feature in the future.

"I've had a number of conversations with residents, but people are divided. But in future, when we do have large events, we should have it."

Fan walk here to stay
Cape Times
July 9, 2010

Cape Town: Where Walking Is An Option

This post from ESPN discusses the poor walking environment in Johannesburg, and the safer and more walkable urban realm of Cape Town.

Cape Town is different. Police and security guards line pedestrian corridors and populate street corners, so that it's possible for people of all races to stroll from pub to club to restaurant after midnight without ever dealing with an automobile.

In the grand scheme of things, that's a recipe for safety. The security of car travel is an illusion here; highway wrecks were a common sight. I counted six in one day early in the tournament, and the tournament opened with a tragedy when Nelson Mandela's 13-year-old great-granddaughter died after the opening concert, the victim of a drunk driver.

A stroll in South Africa -- weird, huh?
ESPN
July 5, 2010

Thanks to urban planning student Linden Weiswerda for the link!

Success on Cape Town's Fan Walk

This post from Cool Town Studios gives a favorable review of the Cape Town Fan Walk, a pedestrianized 1.6 mile/2.6 kilometer promenade connecting the Green Point Stadium with the central business district.

You can’t ask for a more entertaining walk, or rather, experience. What’s more, it’ll be a cultural showcase of the best Cape Town and South Africa have to offer in terms of local food (braai, potije, boerewors, gourjons…) to local entertainment (from live bands to drum circles).

Now, in the spirit of crowdsourcing, with the tremendous success of the Fan Walk demonstrated by the enthusiastic crowds, should there by any surprise that the local government is now looking at making it more of a permanent feature?

Also linked this video about planning the Fan Fest:



Cape Town’s spectacular World Cup fan walk
Cool Town Studios
July 9, 2010

Cruise Ships Pull Out

Luxury cruise ships that had initially planned to dock in Port Elizabeth and other coastal World Cup host cities to serve as accommodations have announced that they won't be coming for the Cup.

Some tour operators have been left licking their wounds after the trip was cancelled due to a lack of cabin bookings.

The two cruise ships, the Noordam and the Westerdam, among the most luxurious in the world, were to have docked in Port Elizabeth, Durban and Cape Town and been used as bases for fans.

Africa 4 Real Tours owner Mark Heck said the cancellation was a real blow to the industry, and especially to his company, which had been contracted to provide local transport operations for the tourists.

Luxury liners won’t be docking in PE to serve as Cup hotel
The Herald
May 24, 2010

Cape Town Accused of Cleaning Poor From Streets Ahead of Cup

Cape Town residents are accusing the city of forcibly moving poor people outside of the city center ahead of the World Cup. Local officials deny that this is a clean-up operation.

Homeless people claim they have been forced off the streets and taken there in an attempt to "clean up" before kick-off next month.

The city denies this, saying it is part of general policy.

"There has not and will not be a concerted clean-up campaign," said city spokesperson Kylie Hatton.

Cape Town's clean-up
Mail & Guardian
May 21, 2010

Cape Town's Plan To Clean Up Homeless

The city of Cape Town has released a plan to address its homelessness, focusing on providing housing, supplying jobs and reuniting homeless people with their families. This plan was announced with just 34 days left before the start of the World Cup.

Armed with more than 1 000 disposable razors, 6 000 bars of soap, 6 000 toothbrushes, 4 000 tubes of toothpaste and 1 000 blankets, the city is also to make sure the people are clean and well groomed for the duration of the programme. It will also create 600 temporary jobs to assist vulnerable people with the reintegration process, paying them R40 a shift. And for the first time, the city has set up a homeless people operation centre that will co-ordinate all activities and function after normal working hours.

City unveils 2010 for homeless
Cape Times
May 7, 2010

Cape Town Stadium's High Lighting Costs

It costs roughly 350,000 Rand a month (~$46,000 USD) to light Cape Town Stadium.

City spokesman Pieter Cronje said the city would be responsible for the operating cost of the stadium - including electricity - until it is handed over to the operator, Sail Stadefrance, in November.

While acknowledging that the electricity charges were high, Cronje said they had been budgeted for.

The bill shows that the stadium is an energy-guzzler, with R272 000 worth of electricity used in the September-October billing period, R352 000 in November, R312 000 in December and R308 000 in January.

Shocking cost of lighting up CT stadium
Cape Argus
April 29, 2010

Cape Town's Baboon Robbery Threat to Increase During Cup

Baboon-jacking is expected to increase in Cape Town during the World Cup, where visitors in unlocked cars are likely to become victims to Fred, the alpha male leader of a 26-member troop of protected baboons that routinely enters and robs cars.

"Every day, it happens," said Mark Duffell, leader of a team that tracks Fred's 26 member troop as they forage between Cape Point and the outskirts of the picturesque Simon's Town naval base and penguin colony.

"He'll hit four or five cars in like five minutes. Fred's
operation is to open car doors. He leaves normally with a handbag. Until he's satisfied he's got all the food, don't try get the bag back."

Cape Town on alert for baboon-jackers
Mail & Guardian
May 4, 2010

Taxi Industry Vows to Violently Disrupt Cape Town's Transit Plans

Taxi officials in the Western Cape have vowed to violently disrupt the implementation of Cape Town's Integrated Rapid Transit system. This is despite efforts by officials to bring taxis into the Integrated Rapid Transit system planning. Taxi leaders say those efforts have not been enough.

The Western Cape National Taxi Alliance (WC-NTA) made the threat after the city announced that it had appointed a company to operate the buses, bringing it one step closer to launching the project's first phase.

A report by Mike Marsden, executive director of the major projects department, said the city had signed a contract with TransPeninsula, a company formed by inner-city taxi associations, to provide vehicle operator services until October. This will include transport during the World Cup. According to the report, the agreement is the first in SA to incorporate the taxi industry into the IRT.

Cape taxi body threatens to thwart IRT
Cape Times
May 5, 2010

Cape Town's Handicap-Accessible Fan Park and Stadium

The new Cape Town Stadium and the fan park area leading up to the stadium will be handicap-accessible, according to local tourism officials.

The route through the city to the new Cape Town Stadium is fairly disabled-friendly.

Cape Town tourism authorities say the city has gone out of its way to make the World Cup an accessible and enjoyable experience for disabled soccer fans.

Cape Town Tourism chief executive Mariette du Toit-Helmbold said the city would ensure that disabled fans got to the stadium and fan parks in comfort.

Stadium is 'disabled-friendly'
Cape Argus
April 30, 2010

Cape Town Street Vendors Pushed Out for Fan Park

More than 300 street vendors in Cape Town' Grand Parade area have been instructed to leave the area beginning May 1, and not return until after the World Cup is over. They are being removed to make room for a fan park.

"According to the host-city agreement, the city is legally obligated to provide a stadium and a fan-fest area," said Thembinkosi Siganda, Cape Town's director of economic and human development.

"After a location analysis the city identified the Grand Parade as a fan-fest area and this was approved by Fifa."

Cape traders to be moved ahead of World Cup
April 26, 2010

The Story Behind Green Point's Unlikely Choice as Cape Town's World Cup Venue

A recent investigation reveals how FIFA encouraged the government to use Cape Town's Green Point as the site of the city's World Cup venue, despite another stadium being fit to host the event. The investigation is one chapter in the new book "Player and Referee: Conflicting interests and 2010 Fifa World Cup", which was released by the Institute for Security Studies

In the chapter by Schoonbee and Brummer, they outline how Fifa and the Local Organising Committee (LOC), "effectively Fifa's agent", pressed the City of Cape Town into signing off a last-minute decision against the preferred venue, Athlone Stadium.

South Africa's initial World Cup bid fingered Newlands Stadium as Cape Town's venue. Fifa accepted this, but the 40 000 seater would not be able to stage any games beyond a quarterfinal. Athlone, however, was the City of Cape Town's choice.

How Green Point beat Athlone for 2010 stadium
Independent Online
April 29, 2010

Cape Town Rapid Transit System Close to Complete

Cape Town's Integrated Rapid Transit system is coming into shape, and officials say it will be ready to launch ahead of the World Cup.

Hatton said all the infrastructure projects geared for World Cup transport would be ready by the time the crowds arrived.

The ticket kiosk at the Granger Bay station was installed yesterday, and other stations would be completed over the next month.

Bus delivery was on schedule, and batches of buses would begin arriving weekly from next month.

Cape IRT passes critical test
Cape Argus
April 22, 2010

Cape Town International Airport Expands

Expecting growing crowds in coming years, an expansion of Cape Town International Airport is nearly complete, setting the airport up to handle upwards of 14 million travelers a year.

In 2005, the modest regional airport, designed to carry just four million travellers, was struggling to process eight million people.

But after five years of construction, the R2.3bn transformation into a world-class masterpiece is nearing completion in time for the World Cup.

It will give the Western Cape and the city an airport that has already been named the best airport in Africa.

Cape shows off multi-billion rand make-overs
Cape Argus
April 23, 2010

Cape Town Establishes Program to Protect Children During World Cup

Officials in Cape Town are setting up a system to handle lost and runaway children during the World Cup. Specifically, the program seeks to protect children from human trafficking, sexual exploitation and substance abuse.

Together with Home Affairs and non-governmental organisations, the department of social development has established a school holiday programme for local children. It has also set up places of safety for children at stadiums and public places as well as interpreters for children who speak foreign languages.

“We have put everything in place – social workers, interpreters and places of safety,” spokesperson for social development MEC in the Western Cape Danny Abrahams said.

Abrahams said they would put “lost children” or “runaways” in places of safety until the World Cup is over. He said they would also work with Home Affairs and International Relations in cases where children are from other countries.

Plan to keep children safe during World Cup
Sowetan
April 8, 2010

Cape Town's Poor Outraged Over 'Temporary' Housing Area

Street people displaced from Cape Town streets are calling their forced relocation like living in a concentration camp. The temporary housing area was built in 2008 to temporarily house the homeless, but residents say the makeshift township is little more than a bandage on an endemic problem in the city. Upwards of 15,000 people are estimated to live in this grouping of shacks, which the city says was designed to house only about 1,600 people.

This is Tin Can Town, or Blikkiesdorp, described by the mayor of Cape Town as a "temporary relocation area" (TRA), but by its residents as a concentration camp. Many say they were forcibly evicted from their former homes and moved here against their will. And for this they blame one thing: the football World Cup.

"It's a dumping place," said Jane Roberts, who lives in the sparsely furnished structure known as M49. "They took people from the streets because they don't want them in the city for the World Cup. Now we are living in a concentration camp."

Life in 'Tin Can Town' for the South Africans evicted ahead of World Cup
Guardian
April 1, 2010

Homeless Being Pushed Out Of Cities Ahead of World Cup

More than 1,000 homeless South Africans are being moved out of Johannesburg and Cape Town ahead of the World Cup, angering human rights activists for sweeping the problem away instead of trying to solve it.

More than 800 tramps, beggars and street children have already been removed from Johannesburg and sent to remote settlements hundreds of miles away and in Cape Town, up to 300 have been moved to Symphony Way Temporary Relocation Area where 1,450 families are crammed into a camp designed for just 650 people.

The moves have happened in Cape Town and Johannesburg but it is believed that other host cities are also drawing up plans to tidy the streets. Johannesburg councillor Sipho Masigo confirmed it was a big problem but likened the actions to cleaning your house before you have guests.

Homeless South Africans getting moved out of major cities ahead of 2010 World Cup
World Cup 2010 South Africa
March 28, 2010

Inside South Africa's World Cup Stadia and Host Cities

The Guardian's David Smith visits the new World Cup stadia in South Africa. He brings this audio profile of the country's readiness and the Moses Mabhida Stadium in Durban.

He talks with Local Organizing Committee head Danny Jordaan about the significance of the World Cup, and Western Cape Premier Helen Zille about Cape Town's safety during the Cup.

Football World Cup preview: 'Durban - one of the most spectacular stadiums in the world'
Guardian
March 17, 2010

Cape Town to Face Capacity Test

In a final test of its readiness, Cape Town's new World Cup stadium will host a capacity crowd on April 10 for an international soccer match. Roughly 68,000 spectators are expected to attend.

The challenge will follows a prayer gathering on Monday, when more than 55 000 people are expected to pack the Cape Town Stadium.

Transporting spectators to and from the stadium is expected to be the city's biggest challenge during these two final test events.

Organisers have vowed to make it easy for soccer fans to get to the final event but authorities say transport and traffic management will be a major challenge.

Stadium to test capacity at soccer challenge
Cape Argus
March 16, 2010