MyJHB

Stuff from Johannesburg

Industry insight: Motorists score as OEMs look to evolve their business models

Johannesburg, Gauteng, South Africa in the news:

  1. Industry insight: Motorists score as OEMs look to evolve their business models: It’s said that if car makers don’t change the way they do business with customers, they will lose out to companies that evolve … – “Johannesburg” – BingNews
  2. Graft trial resumes for South Africa’s jailed ex-president: The corruption trial of former South African President Jacob Zuma has resumed more than a week after his imprisonment for contempt of court in a separate case set off rioting. – “Johannesburg” – BingNews
  3. EXPLAINER: What caused South Africa’s week of rioting?: South Africa has been rocked by the worst violence since the nation achieved democracy in 1994. Here is a closer look at the unrest. WHAT TRIGGERED THE VIOLENCE? The unrest began on July 8 when former … – “Johannesburg” – BingNews
  4. Virgin Atlantic reopens on-board bars and JFK lounge: Virgin Atlantic has reopened its on board bars for the first time in 15 months in line with Covid restrictions on hospitality being lifted in the UK today. The airline’s social spaces are open to … – “Johannesburg” – BingNews
  5. ‘Embarrassing’ red card that divided rugby is overturned after huge outcry: Wallaby wing Marika Koroibete was sent off for a high tackle just five minutes into Saturday’s victory over France … – “Johannesburg” – BingNews

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Did you know this about Johannesburg? Midrand was established as a municipality in 1981 (in an area known as Halfway House, after its position between Pretoria and Johannesburg), but ceased to be an independent town in the restructuring of local government that followed the end of apartheid in 1994. It was incorporated in the City of Johannesburg Metropolitan Municipality in 2000.

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Top Star Drive-In: Destroyed by What Created it

However, the very thing that created the Top Star eventually destroyed it. Because the early miners had used crude methods, the Ferreira Dump—and dozens of others like it—still contained significant traces of gold. As the price of gold rose and new chemical extraction technologies (like the carbon-in-pulp process) made it profitable to “mine the waste,” the ground beneath the Top Star became more valuable than the cinema itself. In 2006, despite fierce opposition from heritage groups who argued that the dump and the drive-in were culturally significant landmarks, the projectors were turned off for the last time.

The reclamation of the dump was a staggering industrial feat. Starting in 2008, mining giant DRDGold used high-pressure water cannons to “monitor” the dump, turning 5 million tons of solid earth back into a liquid slurry. This slurry was then piped 40 kilometers across the province to a processing plant in Brakpan. By 2011, the “mountain” had completely vanished. The 50-meter-high plateau that had dominated the southern skyline for a century was reduced to a flat, dusty crater.

The disappearance of the Top Star is a poignant symbol of Johannesburg’s “extractive” nature. It is a city that consumes itself to stay alive; even its historical landmarks are subject to the fluctuating price of minerals on the London and New York stock exchanges. Today, if you drive along the M2, there is an empty space in the sky where the Top Star used to be. While the reclamation removed a source of toxic dust and “acid mine drainage,” it also erased a piece of the city’s collective memory. The land where the gold-flecked mountain once stood is now being rehabilitated for light industrial use, proving that in eGoli, even the horizon is for sale if there’s enough gold hidden inside it.