John P Cutmore, Tygerhof
I am in total agreement that to renovate the old wooden bridge is a total waste of money.
It serves no purpose since the new one was constructed next to it, and to preserve it for sentimental reasons at such a huge cost makes absolutely no sense at all.
However, I tend to think there is a far better use for the money than to spend it, as you suggest, on socio-economic ills. Without water, all of us would be in dire straights.
The money would be far better spent by local government to ensure that we all have enough potable water to drink in the years ahead as global warming takes hold and our rainfall steadily decreases.
I read a while ago of a company in Somerset West who manufacture desalination plants that fit into a container and even larger ones for municipalities.
Some of these could be used and powered by waste heat from Koeberg nuclear power station or by the abundance of sunshine that we are blessed with.
I am not an engineer, but I am sure that the existing water pumps and pipelines could be modified without too much expense to pump desalinated water back from the coast to the storage dams.
All it would need is for the local government to stipulate that from say 11 pm until say 5am, potable water would be stopped from flowing into the city so that the desalinated water could be pumped to the storage dams during those hours.
I have not seen any bright spark from local government come up with a plan to cure our water ills, so maybe my plan would work, or at least prompt others to dream up a better plan.
