Roads memorial…

The recent frisson of interest in the bedevilled new road project for the South Coast had Chris Bennett hunting around a bit.

PORT Edward is one of a string of little towns and villages along the east and south coast of Africa that have seen an interesting three hundred years or so. Some, like Port Elizabeth, have grown to huge conurbations, while others, like Port Shepstone, have grown to be of local, rather than national importance.

Then there is Port Grosvenor, between Port Edward and Port St Johns, now little more than a building or two and some poignant memories.

Port Edward came into being as Kennington, the same name as the south London suburb in which the great Oval cricket ground is to be found. In the case of Port Edward, the name Kennington was used because the founder’s name was Ken (TK Pringle).

Pringle, according to TV Bulpin, bought the area from Edward Stafford, after who Stafford’s Post is likely named. In 1924, in this case according to Eric Rosenthal, Pringle gave the village which had grown near his homestead, Banner Rest*, the name Port Edward, in honour of the visiting Prince of Wales, later to be the less than salubrious Duke of Windsor.

This sleepy little town has developed in a rather higgledy piggledy way; that is until now.

Rumours of roads, at least a road, have abounded in this area for a long time now. The recent announcement in the Herald of the implementation of plans to build the new N2 has woken things up a bit. Many local business people have worked hard, and successfully, to improve the lot of the little town, which now boasts an excellent shopping centre at the robot (there is only one).

Visits to the website for the new road have produced very little. I eventually gave up my attempts to find a proposed route for the road. The main topic of conversation and stoep talk around here these days is ‘where will it go?’

Where indeed? Given that the road, serious and plentiful objections notwithstanding, will be built, it would be nice to know where.

A friend not entirely unconnected with all these rather grandiose plans has suggested that it might be more practical and cheaper to build a new road across the lands from Southbroom to the low-level bridge on the old Ezinqolwezi-Bizana road and take it from there.

Should the road sail through the middle of Port Edward, which would bring, to my mind, little advantage to the town, what happens when it meets the rickety bridge at the crossing to the casino? I say rickety because it should be remembered that hooligans blew the thing up late in 2002. I gather it has never been the same since, and who can blame it? On top of that it is scarcely more than one lane wide.

I can’t help wondering, taking into account about a hundred years of administrative neglect in this part of the world, what would have happened if some bright spark had built a railway line from Port Shepstone down to Mthatha. But then, seeing that we have thrown most of the train sets away, maybe that wouldn’t have helped much.

As somebody said, we live in interesting times.

*By the way, does anyone know how Banner Rest became Banner’s Rest. There never was a Mr Banner, after all.