About The Princess Vlei Forum

The Princess Vlei Forum is a nonprofit, non-partisan organisation comprising individuals and organisations to ensure the ongoing conservation of the Greater Princess Vlei Conservation Area (GPVCA) for the benefit of communities and nature.

The mission of the Forum is to: 
  • Protect the space: to ensure through legal and civic action that the land is not sold, and that the public open space around the vlei is granted long term protection on environmental and heritage grounds. 
  • Imagine the space: To realise the community vision for the space, and lobby for resources from the City and other sources to enable its transformation into a nature and heritage park; to restore the natural systems on the site.
  • Encourage community use of the space for different activities by making it inviting, safe and accessible
  • Empower community members to be long-term stewards of the this and other public spaces through environmental awareness programmes, awakening passion and love of nature in young residents, networking and organised action.

The Forum was launched October 31, 2012 to co-ordinate a long-standing struggle to protect the  vlei from commercial development.  This grew to attract support from all over Cape Town and beyond. On March 22, 2014, the historic decision to scrap the proposed for the mall was announced by Deputy Mayor Ian Nielson at the Princess Vlei Forum's day of Action and Celebration.

In December 2015, after months of negotiation, the Forum signed a Memorandum of Agreement with the City of Cape Town, recognising the Forum as a community partner in the management and transformation of the GPVCA.

Since March 2014,  Forum has been working with the City to ensure that the area is transformed in accordance with the community's vision of a nature and heritage park at Princess Vlei. This vision was generated through several workshops, surveys, and conversations with community stakeholders during our Imagine Princess Vlei campaign. The City has now finalised a Concept Development Plan for the area, based on this community vision, the Forum's ongoing engagement, and feedback from the public. Implementing and developing this plan is in progress. The Forum has raised over a million rand so far to fulfil our mission. For the past three years, the Forum has raised the salary for a dedicated manager at Princess Vlei. This intervention has transformed the site, and we are currently lobbying the City to ensure that a permanent post for a site manager is created. 

Read more about our Associated organisations

Read more about our activities.