A prominent winelands property developer says he will have to erect a R7m fence across the mountainside overlooking Stellenbosch unless the municipality agrees to a land exchange.

TimesLIVE reports that Werner Roux says the fence would encircle his company’s property on the slopes of Botmaskop, where he is building the Botmaskop residential estate.

However, it would prevent hikers and mountain bikers from crossing the top of his land and accessing the mountain range and valley beyond.

It would also prevent municipal workers from using service roads, as they have been doing for years.

In a proposal served before the local council late last year, Roux outlined an alternative plan: swap the top piece of his land for a similar piece of land near the bottom, adjoining the area he is developing.

‘We propose to swop the two portions of 4.69ha each in size ... to secure the long-term access (to) and free flow between the various pockets of land, in support of the larger Stellenbosch community,’ Roux said in a motivation letter as part of the company’s application to the municipality.

In effect, the exchange would replace an existing ‘land-share’ deal formalised six years ago in an encroachment agreement between the municipality and the previous owner of Roux’s mountainside property.

TimesLIVE notes that the agreement enabled the municipality to freely access service roads criss-crossing the top part of the vacant property, which is covered in plantation and natural vegetation.

It also allowed the previous owner access to municipal land adjoining the footprint of the planned residential development.

Roux said the encroachment agreement, which served its purpose at the time, would not work in the context of a multimillion-rand development that received environmental authorisation in 2021, shortly before his company purchased the land for R200m.

The proposed swap is supported by the Stellenbosch Trail Fund, which maintains popular routes on the slopes of Botmaskop. 

‘Access to three of the most important trails on Botmaskop – Goddess, Corkscrew and the traverse trail to Banhoek – will be destroyed,’ the fund said in a submission to council.

Critics of the land swop claim Roux is effectively using the threat of prohibited mountain access to ‘strong-arm’ the council into giving him land more suitable for development.

Full TimesLIVE report