Residents in Kensington and Factreton are calling for urgent intervention following a spate of robberies at Century City railway station in recent weeks.
Residents say more police visibility is needed in the area especially during peak hours.
Britney February says she fears for her safety daily as she walks to the station to catch a MyCiti bus.
“It’s really dangerous there. I was walking once and when I looked around I saw that a man was running towards me. I started running too and when I looked back again he was suddenly gone. On another occasion my sister and I walked to Canal Walk and there were three guys robbing a women, so we turned around.”
February says with the winter season fast approaching she feels even more unsafe.
Kevin Alexander, a community activist, says crime around the railway station has been addressed with various stakeholders like police, the Passenger Rail Agency of South Africa (Prasa) and law enforcement for the past 10 years, but according to him requests for help with security have fallen on deaf ears.
“The situation is unchanged and has now worsened with the recent spate of daily robberies of commuters and workers by street children using the pedestrian walkway to Canal Walk via the station bridge. It is unacceptable that the Kensington and Factreton community’s safety concerns are being ignored in this manner, year in and year out.”
Alexander appeals to the Kensington police management to patrol the area regularly and urged the community to report all crime to police.
“Our residents and non-residents using this walkway daily are unsafe and are being robbed daily. It is not always possible for community watch members (who are all volunteers and many working full-time during the day) to patrol this area at all hours of the day.”
Cheslyn Steenberg, Chair of the Kensington Community Policing Forum (CPF), says members of the CPF neighbourhood watches have started patrolling the railway station from Tuesday 26 April.
According to Steenberg they have alerted police and patrols by officers and law enforcement agencies are “ongoing”.
“Whilst we seek a solution, visible patrols will be done, but that will not and cannot be enough, a permanent and sustainable solution is needed. Let’s not pass the blame because crime is everyone’s business.”
Steenberg says more needs to be done to address the scourge.
“Crime requires a community intervention for it to be halted. Let’s be frank, we know who the perpetrators are, but we remain silent, we know where the goods are sold yet we remain silent.”
He says residents need to start taking back their community.
“Let us place solutions on the table. In certain pockets of Kensington and Factreton, residents took ownership of their streets and established neighbourhood watches – they patrol every single night without any form of remuneration whatsoever and it was proven that property related crime in those pockets have drastically reduced, the question is – what can, or will we do together as a community to stop these robberies?”
Leslie Swartz, Chair of the Kensington Factreton Residents and Ratepayers Association, believes impoverishment and the huge unemployment rate within the area are just some of the major contributing factors to the crime spike.
“The mountain of land which has been left behind by the principle developers of the station greatly obscures the visibility of individuals coming and going at the station. This land must be levelled or pushed back as far as possible.”
Swartz suggests among others that the station be fenced and that a barrier should be erected to the pedestrian walkway.
“More eyes are definitely needed on the side to deter the criminals. Transnet needs to commit to higher levels of social responsibility as the said site is on their property. Maintenance of overgrown vegetation is also a priority.”
Prasa had not commented at the time of going to print.
