New housing development at Cape Town’s Fruit & Veg site: What it means for residents

Affordable housing activists have welcomed the City's announcement of 237 social units to be built at the "Fruit & Veg" site in the CBD, but voiced concerns over the income bracket  expectations and called for national subsidies to be included.

The mixed-use development is also expected to include 375 residential units and 435m2 of retail space.

Mayor Geordin Hill-Lewis said the process had reached Council's approval for the final release of the City-owned land.

The 3 300m2 property is located between Kent and Bloemhof Streets, right on the edge of District Six and the CBD.

Hill-Lewis said the social housing unit yield increased from the originally proposed 180, to 237 units as part of the proposal by developer YG Group and was transferred for R10 million.

The agreement is that it would include 237 units for social housing.

The piece of land is currently being leased by Food Lover’s Market  and will terminate with the option of returning once the development is completed.

“This is the kind of address that can change people’s lives and open up entire new avenues of opportunity for them. Social housing is being maximised on this site thanks to a range of new measures passed by the City, including guidelines for discounting land, property rates and utility charges for this development," said Hill-Lewis.

“We pledged to speed-up the delivery of more affordable accommodation across Cape Town, and so far this term we’ve released more land for social and affordable housing than in the ten years prior combined. 

“This is just one of the important ways in which we are breaking down the spatial legacy of the apartheid era by offering far more affordable housing options in all well-located urban centres in the metro where people want to live and work.”

He highlighted further progress under the City’s priority programme for Accelerated Land Release for Affordable Housing, including an affordable housing pipeline of 12 000 units across the City, including thousands of units in inner city areas such as Woodstock, Salt River and Maitland; legislative reform for building approval in Cape Town at a quicker pace; and support for micro-developers including a new township development fund to help reduce development costs and pre-approved building plan templates.

Human settlements mayco member, Carl Pophaim, said the accelerated land release meant the projects will feature in the national funding pipeline of the Social Housing Regulatory Authority (SHRA). 

“To really ignite the social housing sector in South Africa, we need the national government to come to the party when it matters  in their actual budgets as opposed to the promises made during State of the Nation Addresses," he said.

The City said they aimed to deliver social and affordable housing at households earning between R1 850 and R32 000 per month.

Yusrah Bardien, communications and engagements officer at Ndifuna Ukwazi, said while the move was positive, they were concerned about who would be able to afford the units.

“We welcome the City of Cape Town’s long-awaited release of the Fruit &Veg site for social housing.

“Designated for this purpose since the 2017 prospectus of 11 City-owned parcels, its release is a critical, albeit delayed, step towards addressing the housing crisis.

“However, this progress is profoundly undermined by the decision to widen the income bracket for social housing, which has now breached the R30 000 mark. 

“We are concerned this policy shift means the resulting units will primarily cater to the upper end of the market, effectively excluding over 75% of Cape Town’s households, those who earn less than R22 000 per month. 

“This raises a crucial question: for whom is this ‘affordable housing’ truly built, and who is it leaving behind?"

Karen Hendricks, Reclaim the City leader at Cissie Gool House, said it had been their call and plight for years.

“The movement has been campaigning for these sites in the inner city since July 2017,” she said.

“We hope to see progress on the site, as with other sites that are released where not too little progress has been made in the name of housing speculation."

Brett Herron, GOOD Party secretary-general and MPL, who delivered a debate on affordable housing said: “Cape Town has one of the worst housing backlogs in the country. Hundreds of thousands of people are on a waiting list that moves slower than this project has moved in 15 years. In fact, the current count is roughly 688 824, so these social housing units barely make a dent in that deficit.”

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