Vincent, Berea braced for outage

Elecrticity supply in parts of Vincent and Berea will be interrupted for up to 12 hours today – from 6am to 6pm – as Buffalo City Metro (BCM) upgrades its Vincent switch house.

A metro advert published in the Daily Dispatch yesterday said affected areas would include Warwick Road, Devereux Avenue, Chamberlain Road and Western Avenue.

One of the owners at Ashmel Centre Spar in Chamberlain Road, Delica Macnamara, said for them it would be business as usual.

“We have a generator at the store. The tills will be working. We will not be affected by the outage,” Macnamara said.

The owner of Slater’s Toy Magic, Debbie Maclachlan, said she was not aware of the outage but was prepared, thanks to a generator.

Smaller businesses such as Laundromat in Chamberlain Road will however be feeling the brunt of the outage.

The owner of the Laundromat Esmerelda Zia said no power – meant no business on the day.

“We do not have a back-up generator and whenever there is power outage we have to close the business,” she said.

Zia said thousands of rands would be lost on the day.

Bea Lebenya, who owns a small hairdressing business in Devereux Avenue, said while she understood the need for the upgrade, not having power was bad for her business as she would have to close up shop.

“The upgrade is needed but I also need to make money,” Lebenya said. Metro traffic spokesman Thandy Matebese said traffic personnel would be posted at the following strategic intersections during the power outage:

lDevereux Avenue and Union Avenue;

lWestern Avenue and Meadow Road;

lWestern Avenue and Vincent Road;

lChamberlain Road and Devereux Avenue;

lOld Transkei Road and Devereux Avenue; and

lOld Transkei Road and Beach Road.

“We urge motorists to be patient and extremely cautious during this period,” Matebese said.