The Gauteng Department of Infrastructure Development (GDID) has unveiled the first consolidated pipeline of projects that have been rigorously tested through its newly developed project toolkit.

Over the past two years, the department has been refining its back-office delivery processes to ensure the implementation and delivery of quality public infrastructure on time and within budget, said Infrastructure Development MEC Jacob Mamabolo on Tuesday.

The GDID has now earmarked 340 projects, valued at R4.5-billion, for staggered delivery over the next three years on behalf of the Gauteng provincial government.

The GDID is responsible for the development of public infrastructure for the Gauteng Education and Health departments, as well as the Roads and Transport, Social Development, Sports, Arts, Culture and Recreation, and Agriculture and Rural Development departments, which are aggregated under the acronym STARS.

Taking full responsibility for these projects, beyond factors out of government’s control, such as natural disasters, contractor liquidation and business forum disruption, GDID aims to prove what can be done with focused solutions.

The projects have been subjected to the newly developed Project Readiness Matrix (PRM) – a tool developed completely in-house to monitor the more than 160 non-negotiable steps that a public infrastructure development project takes from conception to completion, to assist in the assessment of all the critical and stage-specific Infrastructure Delivery Management System (IDMS) requirements.

The PRM toolkit will offer the GDID a single point of access for the project status of all projects under its umbrella.

This means that there is no room for excuses when it comes to delivering these infrastructure projects within the stipulated timeframe and budgets – and to the quality required –  as they have been proven project ready.

“It is through this system and other tools that we have developed internally that we are now confident to present . . . assets that we will be delivering to communities in the next three years, starting this 2018/19 financial year,” he told media during a press conference at a GDID hub in Johannesburg.

“In fact, we are so confident that we have brought capacity into GDID that projects will no longer go backwards and forwards, causing frustration for communities who urgently need these facilities to improve the quality of their lives,” he added.

Classified and profiled into three categories – platinum, silver and coal – according to the various stages of development, the first series of projects under the “platinum” banner comprise 63 projects, valued at R459-million, to be completed within the 2018/19 financial year.

Under the “silver” category of projects, 188 projects, with a 2018/19 financial year budget of R966-million, are planned for delivery in 2019/20, while another 89 projects are grouped under the “coal” category, valued at R260-million and being prepared for delivery in 2020/21.

The total project pipeline is expected to grow beyond the nearly R2-billion budget in the 2018/19 financial year as the silver and coal projects receive more funding.

“The project pipeline will be used to prioritise projects which are ready for implementation for tracking and monitoring to improve project management processes, as well as to speed up delivery to Gauteng communities,” Mamabolo commented.