Rates errors

There has been an ongoing thread running through many news reports regarding the recent revaluation for rates purposes, of all properties in the municipal area. It has emerged from these reports that the property valuations were arrived at on a thumb-suck basis. Adjacent properties of similar size have been valued at radically different amounts and humble properties have been valued in millions.

Today's Mercury, August 29, 2008, reports that that city manager Mike Sutcliffe, has admitted to 9000 errors having been found among the 50000 objections received. The errors add up to a R1.72-billion over valuation of the properties concerned. At the time he reported, there were still 20000 objections to be processed and 11000 which had been returned to property owners for more information, so there may be many more than the initial 9000 errors.

** The paper has a follow-up to the story in the previous post, that the navy was after new patrol vessels. The paper reports various experts as saying that the navy's four frigates, which cost R6-billion, "are not ready or up for the job". Other sources reported that the navy does not have the funds to properly operate or support their sophisticated Meko-class frigates. The cost lack of suitable patrol craft apparently prevents the navy from protecting our marine resources from rape.

It comes as no surprise to me that the frigates are unsuitable by being too sophisticated and/or expensive for our needs. I have been aboard one of them, the SAS Mendi, when it visited Durban. There is a write-up on my visit to the ship in the entry for November 9, 2004, on this page. Even to my untutored eye, the vessel looked far too elaborate for patrolling our coasts and seeing off the odd illegal fishing boat. It has a stealth design, is able to seal itself against nuclear and biological hazards, and its primary armament is Exocet ship-to-ship missiles and surface-to-air missiles. What particular enemies, I wondered, was the navy planning to fight.

The manufacturers surely didn't offer any bribes to secure the sale, so I guess that the illegal fishermen are better armed than I gave them credit for... ;-)

Reversing street renaming

The front page in yesterday's Mercury, August 28, 2008, reports that opposition parties in the city council have launched a court attempt to reverse the name changes. The paper reckons that this is the first salvo in what will be a bitter court battle. In another article in the same issue, it was reported that the sister of one of the namees [if there is such a thing] has claimed that her sister's name has been misspelt. Manning Road has been renamed after Lena Ahrens but the signs apparently have her as Lina Arense.

** Not directly applicable to Durban, but it seems the navy are demanding 12 new patrol vessels to a value of about R3.6-billion. This is in spite of the fact that they recently bought 4 frigates worth R6-billion as part of the highly controversial R30-billion arms deal.

See the next post for more on this.

No mass action, please

In a previous post, I mentioned the ongoing Jacob Zuma saga. The threat by local ANC branches to picket procedings is serious enough that KZN Judge President Vuka Tshabalala has called on the ANC not to inimidate the courts. The most worrying thing for the long-term future of this place, as I've said before, is that his supporters seem to have no concern about whether he is guilty or not.

The same paper also reports:

* The new Moses Mabhida stadium is going to cost R200-million more than expected but should still meet the October 2009 deadline. Work is about to start on the stadium precinct.

* The sad fact that 30% of South Africa's municipal councillors are illiterate. Some can't speak English and, therefore, follow the procedings in council meetings. More than two thirds don't understand their roles, responsibilities or local government legislation. These figures are a horrific indictment of our education system and the apartheid regime which spawned it. The report concludes that adult education must become a priority for municpalities and I suppose that might help.

Container port

The Port and Shipping page in the Mercury today, August 27, 2008, has some interesting facts about the Port of Durban. We're apparently no longer the busiest container port in Africa or in the southern hemisphere and slot in behind Jakarta in Indonesia, Port Said in Egypt and Santos in Brazil. In world terms, Port Said ranks as the 38th busiest container port, having handled 2.8 million TEUs (20ft. container equivalents) in 2007. In the same year, Jakarta ranked 27th (3.689 million TEUs), Santos 43rd (2.55 million TEUs) and Durban 44th (2.51 million TEU's).

The page is compiled by Terry Hutson whose Ports and Shipping website is a valuable resource on our harbours and other matters maritme. He tells me that Richards Bay does a bigger cargo volume than Durban but that we are still the busiest harbour in African and the southern hemisphere if you measure by the value of the cargo handled.

Petulance

In the last post, I mentioned the ongoing problem that many of our political supporters don't seem to care if their chosen ones are honest or not. There is a prime example in today's Mercury, of August 26, 2008, which reports that a meeting of the ANC branches in the Durban area has decided to picket the courts and police stations to try and upset Jacob Zuma's trial which resumes next month.

He's very likely going to be our next president and there's no fear that the courts are going to find him guilty if he isn't. Come on, the whole world will be watching closely for any sign that the trial is unfair!

** In the same paper is a comment by city manager Mike Sutcliffe on the new street signs which have been defaced. Sutcliffe is reported as coming up with the somewhat petulant threat that, if the vandalism continues, he will consider pulling down the old street signs as soon as the new ones are put up. Now that'll really teach us a lesson!

John Steenhuisen, leader of the Democratic Alliance caucus in the council, said he was not suprised by the vandalism. I agree. The ANC has had comparatively recent experience of being in the position where no weight at all was given to their views and grievances. I would have thought that they would have been a bit more sensitive about putting others into exactly the same position. Unless the liberation struggle was really only about changing elites....

Right-wing sabotage

There was an article on the street renaming on the front page of the Sunday Tribune yesterday, August 24, 2008, which worries me. It seems that there has been some vandalism of the new street signs which have been going up around town. Deputy Mayor Logie Naidoo was reported as saying that there would always be right-wingers who wouldn't accept transformation and that "if people can't accept it, tough luck for them".

The thing is that the people which rule this city apparently don't get how undemocratic they are being. They are full of the evils of apartheid and yet don't see that forcibly renaming a street, against the wishes of the people that actually live in it, is a product of the same authoritarian mindset. The statement that "if people can't accept it, tough luck for them", sounds like the sort of thing that PW Botha, the Groot Krokodil himself, might have said.

This place is going to end up like Zimbabwe if the ruling party doesn't manage to "get" democracy soon and abandon its strong tendency to authoritarianism. While on the long-term future of this country (and city), I might as well say that, in my opinion, the ruling party is also going to have to abandon the practice of protecting its own, no matter what. The Zuma case is the prime example and it looks as if we are going to get him as president, irrespective of his guilt or innocence.

No wonder we are losing so many skilled people to emigration.

On the buses, again

The Mercury on Friday, August 22, 2008, carried a long article on the background to the city's sale of it buses to Remant Alton and the recent decision to buy them back. Remant Alton claims that they got into trouble because they did not receive as large a subsidy as other bus operators in the country. At the time of the original sale in 2003, I'm on record as saying that the sales was a mistake because the provision of a public service, such as transport, could not be done well by an organisation whose main objective was to make a profit.

Unfortunately, it seems as if the lesson has not been learned because, not only is Remant Alton going to be allowed to continue to manage the bus service until the expiry of their contract perriod, but the service will then be farmed out to a number of smaller operators.

This will also be a big mistake !!!

Note to city fathers: Don't do it! The way to fix the bus service is for city to take over over the running of the buses as soon as possible. The prime advantage is that the bus service will not have to make a profit and the money, which would have been siphoned off, could be ploughed back into improving the service. Durban Transport once did a good job and it can again.

SmartCity Experience

I mentioned the imminent launch of Durban as a SmartCity here and Ethekwini Girl got in touch to say that she has a new blog on the subject here.

Guest blogger: Niki Moore

This piece was written by Durban freelancer Niki Moore back in June 2008. She mentions Moore Road being renamed as Che Guevara Road. I am reliably informed that the first new Che Guevara signs have just made their appearance. Allan Jackson.

I have survived armed robbery, I have survived affirmative action. I have survived bombs and riots and taxi violence. I have even survived load-shedding. But I don't think I am going to survive name-changes.

Durban municipality this last week published the list of 99 streets that are going to have their names changed. I read this list with - at first - idle curiosity, as the entire name-changing process has only held a peripheral interest for me. What's in a name, after all? But as I read the list I was overtaken by a growing sense of unreality. I kept checking the date on the paper to make sure it was not April 1st.

Whoever compiled this list of name changes has almost certainly stepped over the bounds of sanity and is peacefully grazing in the valleys on the other side. What could have been a wonderful opportunity to unite the entire city behind a series of adjustments has instead been turned into the biggest game of one-upmanship that I have yet to encounter.

Taking a very detached view of things, a few of these names are completely innocuous. We all need to honour people who made a contribution to Durban's history and who up till now have been overlooked.

But most of these proposed names have - and have never had - any connection to Durban at all. (Swapo Road? Really? Swapo Road?? Can you really imagine naming the main road through the mink-and-manure Durban North Swapo Road?)

A lot of these people or groups have been fulsomely honoured in other cities where they lived or worked. Some of them are just plain difficult and unwieldy to pronounce. And there are some glaring omissions - Papa Sewgolum is the first one that springs to mind. There are many others.
I think what will really work people up is the fact that many of the existing names have really valid reasons for being there. But they are being replaced by names that are notable only for their sheer ridiculousness.

Let's look at Moore Road. No-one appears to know who Moore was or why a road was named after him. Could have been named after me, for all I know. There does not appear to be anything offensive or objectionable about this Moore. But there would have been no problem if his/her name had been whipped away and substituted for some overlooked Durban luminary. However, these dotty councillors have decided to rename it Che Guevara Road.

So who was Che Guevara? He was a Cuban revolutionary, the gritty darling of the pot-smoking hippies of the 60s - mainly because his half-toned image looked so darn good on a T-shirt. He was Fidel Castro's chief executioner, responsible for the murder of thousands. He was appointed Cuba's Minister of Economics in 1960 - within months the Cuban Peso was worthless. A year later he was given the job of Minister of Industries and within a year Cuba's industries had collapsed. (Actually, now that I think about it, and looking at the city management's current trend, they've chosen quite an apt role model.) He wouldn't even have known where Durban was - that is, if he even knew where Africa was. And the city father's want to name a street after him? Puh-lease - what his link to Durban is I have no idea - unless it's the pot.

However, I am feeling a sneaking sympathy for the councillors who have forced through these names: they reflect the deep-seated and indelible inferiority complex shared by all Marxists. All good Communist revolutionaries are terrified that the uneducated proletariat will forget about their glorious revolution in the daily hurly-burly of making money, and therefore they have to make sure that the great unwashed are reminded of them at every turn. This is why it is simply not good enough to have a Dadoo Street (which actually has a rather nice ring to it and will look good on a signpost). No - it has to be Dr Yusuf Dadoo Street, to prevent anyone thinking it's another Dadoo , perhaps even - gods forbid! - that lazy layabout Yosemite Dadoo who ducked the Struggle and never finished matric.

And then there is the matter of what street names are for. I always thought that a street name was simply a way of defining an address. Sending a letter to "That big white house on the beachfront, you know, the one with the blue curtains, unless it is Monday when the curtains are being washed, then it's the big white house without curtains, and the Beemer parked in front, unless its Tuesday when Madam goes shopping," simply won't do. The shorter and easier-to-pronounce a name, the better. So what's wrong with a Dube Road? Nothing. Not bad. But Dr Langalibalele Dube? Try giving that address to your taxi driver at 2am when you have had a few. You won't know when to stop.

This is how I have found myself living in the Dawn of the Glorious Revolution Crescent. It looks out over the Rates Will Not Be Increased To Pay For The Stadium Park, which regularly gets hit by lightning.

But perhaps there is a certain malevolent genius at work here: these outrageous full-length names are merely a feint - softening up the opposition in order to pave the way for Durban to be renamed Mikeville.

Not that I care much, actually. I am about to move to Sutcliffe's End. It's got a much better view.

A Smart City

The Mercury of August 20, 2008, has provided plenty of grist to my mill over the past few days with the latest item being an article on the progress being made towards making Durban into a smart city. The idea has been to throw open open Durban's extensive fibre optic network to residents to provide us with very low cost phone calls and internet access. Sounds like a great idea and there was a successful pilot, but the idea has has been cooking for so long that we had just about forgotten about it.

It was announced at recent press conference that the system is to be opened up to business and educational institutions before the end of the year. The system was much-hyped by the notables present but I'll believe it when I see it. There were few journalists present for the announcement and no questions. [Edited 24-8-2008]

Scaring off the skilled

In a previous blog entry I remarked that our political leaders seem to be hell-bent on scaring off the very people who have the skills to keep this place running. There are migration consultants who visit Durban every month to service their clients but now we've gone a step further. I see an advert in the today's Mercury, August 20, 2008, which announces that the government of Western Australia is visiting us next month to provide seminars and interviews for people considering packing for Perth. Scary huh?

A land grab ??

The Mercury of today, August 20, 2008, reported that there is a gathering storm after an Ethekwini Municipality threat to expropriate 1200ha of sugar cane land near Umhlanga. The aim is fast-track a low-income housing development on the land which is owned by the Tongaat-Hulett Group. Negotiations are underway about a development in the area but their slow pace is apparently frustrating the housing committee led by S'bu Gumede.

An anonymous property specialist is quoted as saying that the Cornubia development could become "a model for integrated living between people of various race and income groups" but that, it was rushed through and merely consisted of 15000 low cost Smartie-box houses, then it would become a financial and human disaster.

The Democratic Alliance has said that the move to fast-track the development is electioneering and, considering that the next election is in 2009 and that the ANC has been busily making itself enemies all over town, I think they're dead right.

Encouraging developments

I was down at North Beach just after 10AM last Saturday morning, August 16, 2008, and I was amazed to find the place immaculate. There was no litter in evidence, a circular flower bed looked neat and tidy and there were even information signs up describing the fish to be found off our coasts, and on the ins and outs of surfing.

A new addition to the wall of the lifesaver's building was one of the notice boards promised by the city to publicise such information as water quality. Regular readers will know that there has been a major controversy regarding the city's loss of Blue Flag status for its beaches and its decision not to reapply but, instead, to apply its own standards. Background information is here and here and you'll read that the boards were to be put up. As you can see from the picture below, no information had been added to this board by Saturday but, what the hell, Rome wasn't built in day.

I still think we should have reapplied for Blue Flag but I'm pleased with how North Beach was looking on Saturday. All that's still needed in that area is some pots of paint and then to keep it looking that good, no matter what.

Church bell stolen

The Highway Mail, of August 22, 2008, reports that an historic bell has been stolen from St John's Anglican Church in Pinetown. The bell is believed to be 200 years old, or more, and to have have brought from Scotland by Mr AK Murray. It was hung in the market square to warn residents of fire or Zulu attack and was moved to the original church building when the railway arrived in Pinetown.

Moses Mabhida Stadium

Reaching for the sky: the arches that will span Durban's new stadium are coming along. I was passing by there today and stopped off for this picture. The arches, and the stadium itself, are nothing if not impressive in size. The daredevils are probably already considering the feasibility of a trip up and over the stadium via the arches.

I'm still not convinced that a city that can't afford a proper fire department or, apparently, to replace the bulbs in traffic signals should be building such a thing. This is especially so when you consider that there is already a perfectly good stadium situated not a stone's throw from this one.

A city's shame

The Independent on Saturday of August 9, 2008, (Women's Day), has a story on its front page which should make us all hang our heads in shame. It concerns former Metro Police Constable Cherise Cox, who was apparently a highly effective member of the force's dog unit and participated in many arrests. While on duty five years ago, she was shot in the belly through her bullet-proof vest . She has since undergone 15 operations, has lost her large intestine, has suffered tuberculosis of the colon for two years, has been severely scarred, and has major nerve damage in her leg.

She was injured in our service and what do you suppose the city's response has been? She is apparently heavily in debt, having had to pay her medical bills herself, and she has to submit a motivation every two months as to why she should be paid a salary. She has apparently been forbidden to discuss the incident by the city. To make matters worse, the firearm used had belonged to the Metro Police. The weapon was apparently one of many which went missing, but the city's reaction was not a model of promptitude, as reported here in 2006, and here in 2007.

The article in last week's paper seems to have done a bit of good and the Independent on Saturday today, August 16, 2008, reports that a former Metro Police colleague is setting up a trust fund for Cox. I'll keep you posted on developments.

Mayoral Mazavaroo

The past week has not been that cheerful but a column which appeared in the Mercury on Friday, August 15, 2008, made me feel much better. It's in the paper every Friday and consists of open letters penned by Greg Arde and addressed to Mayor Obed Mlaba. In his weekly letter Arde, the self-confessed most prominent member of Durban's Mauritian community, describes the latest developments in his campaign to unseat Cllr. Mlaba as mayor of the eThekwini Munipality.

On Friday, he mentions a recent case in which a worker, caught sleeping on the job, was successfully able to claim he had been praying. Arde makes the point that the councillors (and Michael) [referring to city manager Michael Sutcliffe. Ed.] must have been praying when they agreed to buy back The Remant Alton bus company for R405-million, having sold it for only R70-million in the first place.

Arde says that his latest plan to unseat the mayor will consist of getting politicians to sleep more by luring them into massage parlours for soothing rubs and he even contemplates putting a mild sedative in his Mayoral Mazavaroo, a Mauritian chillie-based relish which always seems to play a large part in his plans for becoming mayor. He reckons that getting politicians to sleep more will radically reducing their opportunities to cause damage.

Thursday snippets

** This is not totally relevant to a Durban blog but it does apply. The Mercury today (August 14, 2008) reports that the Deputy Justice Minister Johnny de Lange has said that the justice system is unacceptably dysfunctional and that fragmented and inadequate crime statistics don't reflect the true situation. The findings of this report have apparently shocked ministers including President Thabo Mbeki. I can't see how they could possibly be shocked when everyone who lives in this country knows of the rampant crime and the disintegration of the justice system. I fear that the ministers might be fools or liars.

** The cost of preparing for the World Cup are going to be R2-billion more than planned. There are many reasons including foreign exchange fluctuations and the fact that some of the new stadiums being built have [unnecessary] "complexities". Have I got news for them! In some cases, the whole stadiums are unnecessary. Like Durban's, for example.

** The paper also reports that the Zulu Royal House is objecting to plans to rename Amanzimtoti after bomber Andrew Zondo (see here for background) and that a ceasefire has been declared in the Taxi war referred to in the previous post. Eleven lives have been lost this year in the feud which was between the Cato Manor and Chesterville taxi associations

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I went to a course being held at the Blue Waters Hotel on the beachfront yesterday. The course was for cold storage operators and was being sponsored by the American government. There were several Anerican speakers present and, after I took the photo I had to take, I went for quick stroll over to the beach. In front of the hotel under the palm trees was a comfortable-looking bench complete with what was clearly not a recent mess nearby.

I wonder what sights like this lead our guests to think about us?

Anyway, back to the course and the thought that you really do learn something new every day. I was there long enough to find out that fire is one of a cold store operator's worst nightmares and that frozen chickens are seriously combustible.

Another day in La La Land

Yesterday's Mercury (August 13, 2008) reported that the city is buy back the buses it sold to Remant Alton but still let Remant Alton run the service. The city is going to buy more new buses and let Remant Alton get its greasy paws on those too.

Sometimes you have to laugh or burst into tears. We sold the buses to them in 2003 for R70-million and are now buying them back for R405-million. And then we're going spend another R192-million on 162 new buses. And Remant Alton is going to be given this bus fleet to run into the ground as well. It seems as if we are to pay off Remant Alton's debts but I can't think why.

At around the time of the sale to Durban Transport in 2003, I wrote in the second edition of Facts About Durban that the sale was a bad idea. Business, and especially the South African model which includes more naked greed than most anywhere else, is not the solution to supplying social services. I knew this but our city fathers, with all their large salaries, didn't.

All I can say is: "I TOLD YOU SO !!!!"

** It seems as if the minibus taxi associations have been having a shooting war. There a spectacular picture on the front page of the Mercury of a taxi, whose driver had been shot and wounded, parked with its front wheels on the roof of a house in Mayville, its back wheels on steep bank and the body of the taxi suspended over a deep chasm. Lord knows how the vehicle managed to jump the gap.

** One cheerful thing about that issue of the Mercury is that they had a fact box on the front page with some stuff about the history of public transport in Durban. Most of these were drawn from the main Facts About Durban site and we were given credit for it.

Sunday odds and sods

The Sunday Tribune (August 10, 2008) today reports that there have been calls from the ANC Youth League for the suburb of Amanzimtoti to be renamed after Andrew Zondo who set a bomb in a shopping centre there. The bomb killed five people, including two women and three children, but the ANC went ahead with its plans to rename Kingsway in Amanzimtoti after him in spite of widespread objection from many quarters, including Zondo's own father.

Now the grinning idiots want to rename the whole suburb after him. The odd thing is that the present name, which means sweet water in Zulu, is not a colonial one. Legend has it that it was given the name by King Shaka himself, when he stopped off at the river with his impis.

Very bad things were done in the name of apartheid but, and this is a very big but, the majority of whites, including myself, voted to end the system as soon as we were given the opportunity to do so. Villains must be punished and heroes praised but the lack of sensitivity shown by our new rulers is way over the top. They are frightening off the very people who were inclined to support them, and the bad news for the ANC is that the people who are currently leaving the country in droves, are the ones who have the knowledge of how to make things work.

The Eskom debacle, where there are not enough trained people to maintain the power grid, is one example. News of another example in the SA Air Force broke recently when it was revealed that the force had lost 91 pilots and 822 technicians since 2005. The Defence Minister Mosiuoa Lekota put the situation down to the fact that "White members have a perception that there are limited career opportunities within the organisation." Another story reported that we have only 20 fighter pilots. That's not the major problem it sounds however, because we apparently haven't got any fighter aircraft, until the back-ordered Grippens arrive.

Come on guys! Your insensitive and confrontational approach is losing you support hand over fist. By all means rename public buildings and highways and new streets; you will get little argument there. When you rename a street or or suburb without any regard to the feelings of the people actually living there, you are cutting off your own noses to spite your faces. If a majority of Amazimtoti residents want to call it Zondoville, then by all means go ahead. Otherwise, leave well alone.

** The paper also reports that the Olympics has cost China an estimated R300-billion. Durban hasn't got that kind of money now and I'm guessing it still won't in 2020.

On a more cheerful note:

(c) 2008 Allan Jackson

Here's me being a bit arty. A view under the pier on the Ushaka Marine World beach taken with a long exposure and sepiarised (if there is such a thing) on computer.

The Olympics and other tit bits..

Yesterday's Mercury (August 7, 2008) had a front page story on Durban's Olympic bid having received a boost. This is all to do with the fact that the International Olympic Committee (IOC) has chosen the city to hold their 2011 congress where, among other things, they will be announcing the host city for the 2018 Winter Olympics. Having the conference here is going to be good for the city but I'm not sure how is that going to boost our own Olympic hopes. In fact, it might even be bad for them because the delegates are going to get a first-hand look at the litter and mess, a fire department that's critically understaffed, traffic lights that don't work, and a public transport system still being run by a company that's proved that it can do no such thing. I can just imagine the delegates all making mental notes to vote for the city for 2020.

** Brigid Oppenheimer was robbed at knifepoint in her Umhlanga House last Wednesday night. but was fortunately unhurt. Somone should collect the stories about her. I remember one that circulated long ago where the manager of a Mayville supermarket received a suspiciously large phone order for delivery from an unknown woman. He was then unwise enough to ask who she thought she was; "You're Mrs Oppenheimer, I suppose"?

** An aggrieved veteran yachtsman was reported as saying that stinky sludge had been pouring into the bay, at Lavender Creek near the yacht clubs, for five days and that nothing had yet been done. I'm surprised that it was only for five days.

** Gino Leopardi, owner of the revolving restaurant on top of John Ross House, said that the restaurant may not be sold after all. It went on auction recently but no offers above the reserve price of R7-million had been received. Great restaurant but finding your seat after going to the toilet does get a bit difficult after a couple of beers.

City council mouthpiece Ezasegagasini Metro (EM), which accompanied the Friday issue of the Mercury, reported that residents of the Metro area have not cut their electricity consumption by the required 10%. A new load-shedding schedule was published in the paper which will be implemented in the event that Eskom requires the municipality to do so. The loadshedding will only effect residential areas and some industrial areas fed from residential areas.

EM also reported that the demolition of the Ocean Sports Centre is to go ahead after it was agreed at a council meeting. I say agreed but, according to opposition parties, the decision was procedurally flawed because a full 24 hours notice had not been given of the emergency executive committee at which it was taken. Why did they need an emergency meeting anyway?

Harbour mouth widening

Photo (C) 2008 Allan Jackson

We were down at the beach in front of Ushaka Marine World before dawn the other day and even then, work on widening the harbour mouth was going on apace.

Public transport lane

I have referred to our new public transport lane in this blog before. I recently had a week of going in to town just before morning rush hour and it was pretty deserted. The mini-bus taxis were mostly using the other lanes.

Artist’s impression of the Public Transport Lane.

Wearing my hat as editor of KZN Industrial & Business News, I received the picture above in a press release. It seems as if the red colour of the asphalt was achieved with an imported colourless synthetic binder and locally-produced iron oxide.

Snake Park

Went down to the beach on Saturday to take a look at where the Snake Park used to be. X marks the spot; click the picture to view a larger version. See the beachfront fence in good condition, as mentioned elsewhere on this blog. What do the tourists think when they see things like this?