South Africa has embarked upon a complex mixture of large-scale spatial development projects including industrial, residential, transport networks, and other recreational infrastructure projects. This has triggered and increased environmental impacts in various forms of pollution, including noise, water, air, and land, as well as climate change and loss of biodiversity. Such environmental impacts have led to community conflicts over the unfair distribution of impacts on vulnerable communities. The main aim of this paper was to identify the environmental effects of the Cornubia Housing development project and examine the reasons behind silence in terms of community outcry due to environmental impacts. The paper was provoked by literature that argues that all mega-projects are prone not only to be detrimental to the environment but also to environmental conflicts and outcries. The paper adopted a qualitative snowball sampling approach for a special reason. The findings revealed not only numerous environmental impacts that emerged from the selected silent project but also the untold stories behind silence from local communities, including socio-political and economic factors; literacy and lack of knowledge; geographical location and attachment to the area; untrustworthiness and corruption from EIA specialists; and pace and duration of the project.

Keywords: Mega-projects, Environmental Impacts, Spatial Planning