Whats That
So a road closure is the strategic closure of certain streets within a suburb, to limit the entry and exit points of vehicle and pedestrians. Living in a closure suburb can Increase your property value between 15 to 30%
What is being closed?
Download the road closure form attached on the home screen or the bottom of this page
So if you are asking why, here is why.
Linmeyer has two prevalent crimes at the moment.
The first is the house robbery for electronic equipment. We have the problem of being along main escape roads, namely South Rand Road and Comaro/ Oak Avenue. The MO used here is hard and fast. The suspects usually lift gates of their rails or bend the rails so the motor doesn't hold them. They they crowbar the security gate open and kick down the door. They steal electronics, usually TV's and computers and then leave. They are in and out in approximately 2 minutes.
The second is street crime. So this is muggings mostly. People being held up at knife/gun point. Risi street is where the majority of this happens. The victims are robbed and the suspects then run across South Rand Road and into the veld and we lose them. This is increasing with people committing robberies like this from a car.
Something that is starting to be more prevalent is gate motor theft.It appears to be seasonal and happens in the early hours of the morning.
How does the road closure help?
By closing streets like Hoek, Aida, Martha and Micheal we limit the quick entry and exit of the above crimes.
The suspects are forced through one central point in the suburb, i.e Johan Meyer Street. There is guard there who has to let every person and vehicle into he suburb. We ARE NOT ALLOWED to restrict the movement of any person through the suburb.
What can be done, if a very suspect vehicle with 4 people sitting in it enters the suburb, is the guard can radio the response vehicle in the suburb and tell them to look for a that vehicle with registration number, and follow them.
This will deter them if they are criminals.
Every closure point has to have a 1m wide pedestrian gate. This will be open during day time hours and closed at night. Being closed at night will deter the gate motor theft and some of the muggings.
What about traffic?
Traffic will be unaffected. during peaks hours, the partial closure gates will be open. These gates are on Aida, Johan Meyer and Hoek street. The booms located on Johan Meyer and Victoria street will be lifted.
I live on South Rand Road
We understand your concern about being outside the closure. We are not going to ignore you.
We have received quotations to put up high tech camera poles on every road closure bordering South Rand Road. This will allow operators to watch for suspicious behavior and despatch vehicles to it.
With Vumatel coming into Linmeyer in the next 3 months, we are Investigating putting VumaCam up. These cameras use complex algorithms to detect suspicious activity and notify responders.
With the interior of Linmeyer being “safer” we can dedicate more resources to the perimeters like South Rand Road. The dedicated vehicle can do more frequent patrols on their to increase visibility. More than that at the moment we can’t do.
Fencing off the veld is upwards of R1m and we won’t get the funding for that.