Corporations Are Branding Potholes They Repair — As Irate Joburgers Tag The ANC

While some Joburg residents are expressing their anger over a lack of service supply by tagging the ANC with spray-painted pothole graffiti, two competing insurance companies are punting their own model while fixing them.

The branding and restore initiative by Discovery Insure and Dialdirect Insurance, nevertheless, is unrelated to the current surge in luminous street messages by irate motorists.

Not only does the initiative between the two rivals date back virtually two years to Might 2021, however it was also launched in partnership with the town of Johannesburg, ブランディング who gave the go-forward for the branding train.

Discovery Insure stated on Wednesday mentioned it needed to make clear that the «Pothole Patrol» partnership between the 2 companies obtained permission from the city of Johannesburg to «brand potholes» when the initiative was launched in 2021.

It said the branding was a way for the 2 «to track and monitor our repairs and has the stamp of approval from the city of Johannesburg and the JRA (Johannesburg Roads Company)».

«It’s also a visible reminder to Johannesburg highway users that they will report potholes to Pothole Patrol by simply downloading the Pothole Patrol app on the Apple App or Google Play retailer,» said Discovery Insure.

Restore restrictions

Anneli Retief, head of Dialdirect Insurance, stated the marketing campaign had resulted in more than one hundred fifty 000 potholes being repaired to date.

There are also strict definitions over what constitutes a proper pothole, with Retief saying that The Pothole Patrol was mandated by town of Johannesburg to repair potholes «measuring 1m by 1m».

«Something larger than this, or deeper than 5cm is referred to as a reinstatement. Reinstatements, street excavations and deep trenches or cracks occur on account of digging during road construction or for making a passage for the laying of services resembling pipes and cables. As such, they don’t seem to be categorized as potholes.»

These «reinstatements» are then «escalated» to the JRA while road defects attributable to underlying water injury are referred to Joburg Water, stated Retief.

Branding bump

Discovery said the work finished thus far equated to about 250 potholes being fastened every single day. This included the 75km stretch of the R556 resulting in Sun City, in addition to a 6km piece of street in Muldersdrift that had 90 potholes.