Some five kilometres outside of Wartburg, and neighbouring Trust Feed Village, essential infrastructure is being developed to support a highly anticipated housing project in KwaZulu-Natal. Once completed, this 160 hectare development will feature about 3 000 low and middle cost housing units as the developer, uMshwathi Municipality, forges ahead with this important social development programme.

Working closely on the uMshwathi Ridge Housing Development project are implementing agents, Dezzo Holdings; consulting engineer, Sukuma Consulting Engineers and main contractor, bpb Sindi Civils. The professional team arrived on site in July 2014, and has made light work of this important project.

This is certainly a milestone for bpb Sindi Civils, which has a long track record working on civil infrastructure for residential projects in the country. The uMshwathi Ridge Housing Development is the largest such project it has undertaken to date, with the company awarded the contract based on its impressive portfolio of completed projects, as well as it very favourable costing during the early tender phases.

bpb Sindi Civils co-owner and project director, Domenico Buccimazza, has been on site since the outset and is proud of the solid track record achieved by his team ahead of its imminent handover at the end of this year. This will pave the way forward for the next phases which will include the construction of the houses, some of which will be allocated to Umkhonto we Sizwe war veterans.

He attributes the success of the contract to bpb Sindi Civils’ wealth of experience undertaking housing related infrastructure projects. This is in addition to the close collaboration between all members of the professional team, starting from the municipality and ending with the contractor at the workface.

“Much of our success can be credited to team effort, which focuses heavily on planning and open communication to avoid disruption wherever possible. We have also found the municipality and implementing agent and engineers to be extremely responsive in helping us to attend to any unforeseen complexities along the way,” says Buccimazza.

While this is a critical project for the contractor, it has also been a key supply contract in KwaZulu-Natal for AfriSam, South Africa’s leading building materials specialist.

Roger Potgieter, national sales manager at AfriSam, says the company is known for keeping a close watch on all projects as they make their way from the conceptualisation stages to a “shovel-ready” state. This has enabled AfriSam to respond well ahead of demand for aggregate and readymix concrete requirements in emerging growth zones.

The uMshwathi Ridge Housing Development project has been on AfriSam’s radar for a very long time. EB Khan, AfriSam’s territory manager for this project, says that the preliminary civil infrastructure phases of the construction programme have certainly been impressive in terms of simulating construction activity, including the demand for quality construction materials in this rural area of KwaZulu-Natal.

By the time the roads are completed, AfriSam would have supplied 31 000 tons (t) of G2 and
14 000 t of G5 aggregate to bpb Sindi Civils.

“This is over-and-above 29 000 cubic metres of readymix concrete being supplied for the construction of the feeder roads leading to the individual stands. AfriSam readymix concrete is also being used to build V-drains, manholes and road curbing,” he says.

Importantly, this contractor is a new account for the construction materials producer, which has enjoyed uninterrupted growth in KwaZulu-Natal. Khan says this is predominantly due to its reputation for being able to guarantee a reliable supply of quality materials to its customers.

Materials are being supplied from AfriSam’s Pietermaritzburg quarry, the largest supplier of dolerite material in the Midlands region.

The operation is bolstered by a readymix plant, which was strategically positioned at the operation to respond to the demand for concrete in the region. It is located a mere 30 km from the site, while another AfriSam batching plant in Umlaas, about 53 km from the project, serves as a back-up point of supply in the event of a failure at the PMB operation.

Buccimazza has been very impressed with the quality of AfriSam’s performance, noting that the company’s stellar performance will form the basis of a longer term business relationship between the two companies.

“We prefer working with suppliers with whom we have nurtured long term relationships, as they understand our unique requirements and will work with us to ensure optimum solutions for both,” he says.

AfriSam’s sound performance on this contract can be attributed to its close co-operation with bpb Sindi Civils.

Khan acts as a strategic communications channel between the construction site and AfriSam’s Pietermaritzburg operation to ensure sufficient material is supplied to the different work faces. Accurate forecasting of the contractor’s requirements is crucial and being a regular visitor to site, he is able to provide information to help the quarry gear up accordingly to ensure consistent supply.

This method of operating has also allowed AfriSam to supply materials ahead of schedule. This ability has helped significantly, especially when the project peaked with materials being delivered at least a day ahead of the programme. “This allowed our construction teams a head start the following morning,” Buccimazza says.

When this phase of the project is completed, bpb Sindi Civils will have built about 25 km of six metre wide blacktop roads that also feature a bus lane, 4 km of 5 m wide blacktop roads and 8 km of 4 m blacktop secondary roads. This is in addition to the 18 km 3 metre wide hyson cell cast in-situ concrete roads that also form part of this project.

While Buccimazza says the project has been fairly straightforward, the construction teams deployed to site certainly encountered their share of challenges.

“We have had to contend with extremely steep and undulating terrain, with water runoff causing severe damage during rains. However, the biggest challenge has been the lack of water in this drought-stricken province. We had to source water from a local farmer in return for supplying him with general fill, as we had run out of our own water supply,” he says.

Buccimazza says bpb Sindi Civils is proud to be associated with this Expanded Public Works Programme by the South African Department of Public Works.

The project is not only going to help attend to the huge housing backlog in the country, but is providing ample employment opportunity during its construction phases. By July, the project had employed between 124 and 160 people, and bpb Sindi Civils as well as AfriSam look forward to embarking on the next phases in 2017.