At a time when Covid-19 has created a potentially long-term global excess of office space as more professionals work from home, the City of Cape Town seems to be considering giving private developers the green light for a controversial R4-billion mega development of residential, hotel and commercial buildings in a public park in the heart of the city.
On 11 December, I joined a small group on a walking tour with civic activists Marc Turok and Tauriq Jenkins through the Two Rivers Urban Park (TRUP). Together with the Observatory Civic Association and the Two Rivers Urban Park Association (TRUPA), Marc, Tauriq and many others have, for many years, been opposing relentless attempts by private developers, now also backed by Jeff Bezos’s Amazon Group, to redevelop the River Club site, a recreational area that is ecologically sensitive and rich in cultural heritage.