Within 10 years Kidd’s Beach, the quiet seaside hamlet, will become a super-suburb.
“It will be East London’s first super-suburb,” said Tjaart van der Walt, founder and owner of MHG (Mission Holding Group) Property Development Specialists, which is developing Kidd’s Beach Green Estate and Kidd’s Beach Retail Centre.
MHG, together with Buffalo City Metro, the Development Bank of South Africa and the national treasury has completed most of the infrastructure necessary for the “super-suburb”, including the intersection on the R72, internal roads, sewage systems, and electricity upgrades. The water pipeline from Bridle Drift dam is almost complete, with a 4km section awaiting construction.
Van der Walt’s vision is a village with 5,000 new houses, with support businesses.
Van der Walt said the development would create 1,000 jobs during the construction phases and 3,500 permanent jobs once the projects were complete. “It will mean that Kidd’s Beach of the future will rank with Mercedes-Benz as an employer. It is already a growth point for the economy of EL and the Eastern Cape.”
Already built are the retail park and a private school, which will go up to Grade 12 in 2020. In the pipeline is an office park, a 100-bed hospital, with three theatres, a technicon, training centre, and student accommodation.
Van der Walt’s vision for the integrated development was sparked in 2007. He was visiting Kidd’s Beach and was struck by its development potential. He said he had a clear vision for a new suburb, and bought the land bordering the R72 which cascades down to the beach. Planning and getting development approvals took seven years.
Construction started in 2016, and demand, he said, “exceeded our estimation”. In three years MHG has built 350 houses, with another 120 reserved, awaiting building. Of the 300 already occupied, 80 are rentals.
Tim Dlulane, MHG business development director, will use his earlier experience as a player and manager of the Bulls’ rugby franchise, to develop a similar high-performance sports institute in Kidd’s Beach. Dlulane was a regular player for the Bulls in the early 2000s, and played one game for the Springboks, but retired due to a serious neck injury.
Hennie van Wyk, a director of Retail Shop Space (RSS) said there were 14 stores but that should double quite quickly. The company is a partner of MHG. “In the long-term there will be five more retail phases, with a gross lettable area of 15,000m². The anchor tenants are OK Foods and DIY Depot, which between them account for 1,300m².” Van Wyk said the demographic studies undertaken by RSS and OK revealed that the five future phases might not be enough to cope with the growth...