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Welcome to The Build Brief
Before there were bakkies on Franschhoek Pass, there were elephants. Literally.
Now the flood battered pass is getting a R1.165 billion rebuild, and it should reopen just in time for the builders’ break.
Up in Limpopo, a safari hotel near Kruger has just become the first in Africa to be verified net zero under a big hotel group’s programme. More on what that means for the trade.
Plus the question every kid asks at a building site. How did that crane get up there, and how on earth does it get down?
We have a quick checklist to keep your site from washing away.
Let’s build better. 👇
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What's hot. What's moving. What you need to know.
This mountain pass started life as an elephant path 🐘
Franschhoek Pass is getting a R1.165 billion rebuild after years of flood damage.
Long before tourists and wine farmers, the route over the Franschhoek mountains was trampled out by elephants on their seasonal migration. Locals called it the Elephants’ Path, and herders and settlers on horseback followed it for years.
An early attempt at a proper road was so steep that a fully laden wagon could not get up it. So in the 1820s, Major William Holloway and soldiers of the Royal African Corps built a gentler route, cut into the mountainside at a steady grade. It was finished in 1825 for roughly £8,000, and it is widely described as South Africa’s first properly engineered mountain pass. Governor Lord Charles Somerset reportedly liked it because it was his preferred route to his favourite hunting grounds.
Fast forward 200 years and the weather has been less kind. Floods in 2023 closed the pass for months, and while repairs were under way, the May 2026 floods damaged it all over again.
The Western Cape Department of Infrastructure says the R1.165 billion MR191 road improvement project, with the extra flood repairs folded into it, is making good progress. The work includes widening and upgrading about 9.57 km of MR191 between Old Paarl Road and Helshoogte Road to a Class 1 road, rebuilding damaged surfaces, improving drainage, and stabilising vulnerable slopes.
The good news for holiday traffic. Infrastructure MEC Tertuis Simmers says the pass should reopen during the builders’ break, from mid December to mid January, with stop and go controls. Full completion is pencilled in for July 2027, weather permitting.
The project is spreading the work around too. Reports put it at more than 94,000 person days of local labour, over R141 million directed to targeted enterprises, and 6 emerging contractors on subcontracts.
The bigger lesson is about resilience. Repeated floods are why this job grew, and drainage and slope stability now matter as much as the road surface. That is a trend worth watching on every project in flood prone areas.
Built for elephants, rebuilt for floods.
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A safari hotel near Kruger just went verified net zero 🌿
Solar, electric kitchens, and less waste, signed off by an independent auditor.
On 27 October, Radisson Hotel Group announced that Radisson Safari Hotel Hoedspruit in Limpopo has become the first hotel in Africa to earn its Verified Net Zero status. The 138 room hotel near Kruger opened in February 2024, so it got there in under 3 years.
So what does net zero actually involve? According to Radisson, the hotel runs on 100% renewable electricity, with SolarAfrica as its energy partner, and has electrified key parts of its operations. It has also switched to lower carbon menus, recycling and composting, and less packaging.
Whatever emissions are left over are covered by carbon removal credits, from a South African project. The whole thing is checked by an independent third party, TÜV Rheinland, so it is not just a sticker on the door.
Radisson says it wants 100 Verified Net Zero hotels worldwide by 2030, and this is the first one outside the UK and the Nordic countries.
Why should a builder care about a hotel’s carbon footprint? Because green credentials are becoming something clients ask for. Solar installs, heat pumps, electric kitchens, efficient lighting, and better insulation are all trade work.
If you can talk confidently about energy efficient options on your next quote, you may find yourself with a head start over the contractor who cannot.
Green building is not a trend any more. It is a line item.
How a tower crane climbs itself, and how it gets back down 🏗️
Ever looked up at a crane on top of a skyscraper and wondered how it got there? It climbed.
Tower cranes start short, put up by a mobile crane. When the building needs them taller, a steel climbing frame wraps around the mast just below the top.
Powerful hydraulic rams then jack the entire top of the crane, which can weigh well over 100 tonnes, up by roughly the height of one mast section, about 6 metres.
That leaves a gap, a new mast section slides in, and it gets bolted down. Repeat until tall enough. During the climb, the crane must not swing round, so the operator often leaves the cab altogether.
Getting down is the clever bit. The crane climbs down in reverse, removing sections, until it can go no lower. Then a smaller crane is assembled on the roof, its parts often small enough to fit in a goods lift.
That little crane dismantles the big one and lowers it to the ground piece by piece. Then the little one is taken apart, and goes home in the lift.
The lesson. Every big job needs an exit plan as much as a start plan, even for the crane.
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Storm season is here. Don’t let your site wash away ⛈️
Franschhoek Pass is a R1 billion reminder of what water can do. Summer thunderstorms on the Highveld, and the odd monster storm at the coast, can undo a week of work in an afternoon.
A quick checklist before the next storm warning.
Watch the warnings. Keep an eye on the South African Weather Service, and plan pours, roofing, and excavations around the forecast.
Give water somewhere to go. Keep drains, gutters, and channels clear, and make sure the site slopes water away from open trenches and foundations.
Check your excavations. Waterlogged trench walls can collapse. Inspect them after heavy rain before anyone goes back in.
Cover and lift your materials. Get cement, timber, and electrical stock off the ground and under cover. Wet cement is just expensive rock.
Tie down anything that can fly. Loose roof sheets, scaffold netting, and offcuts become dangerous in a strong wind.
Know your cover. Check what your contract works insurance covers before you need to claim, not after.
Plan for the storm on a sunny day.
The Digital Toolbox 🛠️🤖
The free app that shows which jobs actually make you money ⏱️
You quoted 3 days. It took 5. Was that job profitable, or did you pay to do it?
Clockify is a free time tracker. You or your crew tap start and stop on a phone, or fill in a simple weekly timesheet, and every hour gets logged against the right job.
After a few jobs, the reports start telling you things your gut cannot. Which jobs overran, which tasks always take longer than you quote, and how many hours really go into a typical bathroom or roof. That is gold the next time you price a job.
It runs on Android, iPhone, the web, and desktop. The free plan covers unlimited projects and time tracking for a small team, and recent reports say it is now capped at 5 users, so check the current limit before you sign up the whole crew. Extras like invoicing and GPS tracking sit on the paid plans.
Free for a small team. Quote from facts, not hope.
Blutide + Dromex + Lesco Range & Pricing 👇
Wrapping up the site 👷🏾♂️
That’s edition 21 signed off and handed over.
Every week, The Build Brief, powered by Supply Sphere Solutions, gathers the news, tips, and tools that help you build better, so you can spend less time searching and more time building.
If this one was worth your coffee, pass it on to someone in the trade. And if you missed an edition, you will find every one of them on our website, from Roman concrete to elephant paths.
See you on site next week.
Build better! 👍
