Swakopmunders want their Mole

AT a recent jam-packed meeting in Swakopmund, the community wanted to know why the Swakopmund municipality had sold a prime public area for private development.

The development in question is the five-star Kempinski Strand Hotel and luxury private apartments, which will be situated in the Mole area, considered one of the best public beaches in Africa.Most of the people at the meeting were against this development by Ohlthaver & List for several reasons.They said nobody was against a new hotel, but not at the expense of public open space.Secondly, the people are unhappy with the way the latest design has been presented by the architects, saying the drawings were unrealistic ‘to make it look pretty’.’It’s like arranging the deck-chairs on the Titanic. But the Titanic will still hit the iceberg,’ said veteran architect Kerry McNamara.The new hotel will occupy an area nearly five times the size of the old Strand Hotel and much bigger than recommended by the municipality’s original long-term plan for this site. It’s also been said that the site was sold to the developers at N$1 000 per square metre, which ‘is nothing’ compared to what they want to sell the private apartments for. The private apartments will be situated on the beachfront, while most of the hotel will be situated at the back. The community asked why the apartments could not be removed from the plan to reduce the size of the development.A member of the Built Heritage Committee, Klaus Brandt, said there were several flaws in the plan, and although it may seem ‘picture perfect’, it should not compromise the public bay area. A point that came out strongly at the meeting is that public open space is more important to local people than the appearance of the building.Before the meeting started, Sven Thieme of Ohlthaver & List made it clear that: ‘We are not interested in a building which the public are not satisfied with, but we are investors, so we all would have to compromise a little’.