As 2025 gets underway, the FoL is celebrating the impact of our organisation & the Liesbeek River community with the publication of our 2024 Annual Report!
As with every year that passes the Friends of the Liesbeek (FoL) by, 2024 was been another unique one.
Cape Town experienced its highest ever recorded rainfall for the month of July in 2024, which naturally provided a range of interesting dynamics for the river. The Observatory wetland project (see report cover image), which commenced in 2023, demonstrated its value during that month, but has also provided our Liesbeek Maintenance Project (LMP) team with a significant workload as we begin to tackle the new growth that has arisen following last year’s site scraping. The floral displays of the site in September and October were particularly dazzling and we are excited for similar displays next year, not only at our Observatory site, but in Mowbray too, where this year we initiated a similar landscaping project as part of our Mandela Day and winter planting plans. In the upper reaches, tree felling and earthworks have commenced at the Boschenheuwel Arboretum, the site of the Protea Development. Our LMP team has already done a lot of search and rescue work to retrieve bulbs from the site, and we aim to do more of this during 2025, if possible.
As usual, we have continued to service and maintain other parts of the river, ensuring that the Liesbeek Trail is clear, safe and desirable to utilise. We partnered with the Ward 59 Councillor, Mikhail Manuel, to establish a viewing deck and an indigenous garden behind the swimming pool in Newlands. We have also initiated a water quality monitoring project, and have included this as part of our new schools programme, with Herschel Girls School being the first participating school. Plans are also underway to create a sustainable urban drainage system (SUDS) pilot project. Although not “sexy”, this year we have retrieved over 3 600 bags of litter from the river, with the LMP team having collected 2 516 bags during our weekly litter runs and the monthly Observatory community cleaning days having removed 627 bags. Critically, we have finally upgraded our LMP vehicle, and have resourced the project well for 2025, with the team well-resourced in terms of tools, PPE and personnel. These stories, and more, are covered in more detail in the report which can be accessed via the link below.
