a tšeletseng a fapaneng mabapi le kholo le taolo ea litoropo. Maikutlo a joalo Published by the UFS hangata a ne a lula a sa tsejoe, hobane http://journals.ufs.ac.za/index.php/trp a ne a shebahala a hlakile, ebile e le © Creative Commons With Attribution (CC-BY) How to cite: Kuhn, J. 2021. Changing urban management doctrines in Cape Town, a boleng ba sechaba sa mehleng e’o. South Africa. Town and Regional Planning, no.78, pp. 65-80. Maikutlo ana a tsamaellana le mohopolo oa thuto ea ho rala, a hlahisitsoeng ke Faludi, mme o neng o ipatile ka mora ketso ea melao le nts’etsopele ea mehleng e’o. Leha ho le joalo, ha nako Changing urban management doctrines in e ntse e ea, lithuto li tsa fetoha, ele ho arabela boleng ba lipolotiki, ntlafatso ea Cape Town, South Africa moruo le boholo ba metse. Lithuto tse tšeletseng li laotse ka nako ea lilemo tse Jens Kuhn ka bang 40, e ‘ngoe le e’ ngoe e bitsitsoe ke mongoli molemong oa tsamaiso ea litsi; ho ithusa; mesebetsi ea sechaba; meralo oa litoropo; ntlafatso, le phetoho. DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.18820/2415-0495/trp78i1.5 Received: August 2020 1. INTRODUCTION Peer reviewed and revised: October 2020 Published: June 2021 In the natural sciences, a ‘paradigm’ refers to a way of thinking about *The authors declared no conflict of interest for the article or title a distinct set of problems and how they are best viewed and Abstract solved (Kuhn, 1970: 10-34). An This review article reflects on the history and growth of Cape Town from its founding unconventional approach to such to its present. In doing so, it identifies a sequence of six distinct attitudes towards problems would be regarded as urban growth and management. Such attitudes often remained unarticulated, for outside the prevailing paradigm they appeared self-evident, even natural, to the society of their times. These attitudes coincide with the concept of Planning Doctrine, as proposed by Faludi, and lie silently (Kuhn, 1970: 10-34). Drawing on behind actual policymaking and development of the day. Yet the Doctrine changes this insight, Faludi (2004: 231) over time in response to political values, economic restructuring and settlement refers to what he terms the Planning scale. Six doctrines dominated for a period of roughly 40 years each, termed by the Doctrine. A planning doctrine is a author as corporate management; self-help; public works; town planning; up-scaling, constellation of assumptions and and transformation. beliefs that strongly influence how Keywords: Doctrine, spatial growth, urban management, Cape Town policymakers consider specific urban problems and their best solutions VERANDERENDE LEERSTELLINGS VIR STEDELIKE BESTUUR IN (Faludi & Van der Valk, 1994: 18). KAAPSTAD, SUID-AFRIKA Should the state be prescriptive or Hierdie oorsigartikel reflekteer op die geskiedenis en groei van Kaapstad vanaf permissive? Should developers be stigting tot vandag. Sodoende identifiseer dit ’n reeks van ses verskillende houdings serving their clients’ or the public teenoor stedelike groei en bestuur. Sulke gesindhede is dikwels nie uitgespreek interest more generally? Should nie, want dit was vanselfsprekend, selfs natuurlik, vir die samelewing van hul tyd. communities seize the initiative Hierdie houdings val saam met die konsep van die beplanningsleer soos voorgestel or demand welfare? Positions on deur Faludi en lê stil agter die werklike beleidsvorming en -ontwikkeling van die dag. these spectrums are bound to be Tog verander die leerstelling oor tyd in reaksie op politieke waardes, ekonomiese herstrukturering en skaal. Ses leerstellings het oorheers vir ’n tydperk van ongeveer instinctive more than articulated. 40 jaar elk en word deur die outeur geïdentifiseer en bestempel as korporatiewe Importantly, the doctrine is not limited bestuur; selfhulp; openbare werke; stadsbeplanning; opskalering, en transformasie. to the planner, developer, citizen or Sleutelwoorde: Leerstelling, ruimtelike groei, stedelike bestuur, Kaapstad the public official, but to everyone active in the field of urban matters. PHETOHO EA BOITHUTO KA TSAMAISO EA LITOROPO CAPE TOWN, In social settings, the doctrine serves AFRIKA BOROA to gather alliances and to create Sengoloa sena sa tlhahlobo se bonts’a nalane le kholo ea Cape Town ho tloha coalitions around specific planning ts’imolohong ea eona ho fihlela joale. Ka ho etsa sena, se supa tatellano ea maikutlo solutions (Faludi, 1999: 333).
Mr Jens Kuhn, formerly Manager: Housing Land and Forward Planning, Cape Town City Council, PO Box 1410, Milnerton, 7441; Phone: 072 810 4650, email:
SSB/TRP/MDM 2021 (78):65-80 | ISSN 1012-280 | e-ISSN 2415-0495
65 SSB/TRP/MDM 2021 (78)
It makes doctrines the strongest form 2. METHODOLOGY three elements exhibiting urban of influence planners exercise on the change were profiled: demographics; The conviction prompting this article urban agenda – that is, until such the physical footprint of the city, is that the ideas in society about time as anomalies begin to appear and its economic growth and size. how human settlements ought to or “explosive issues” arise that be built and cared for, change with undermine its coherence and logic, or Books and articles related to Cape time. In due course, one idea gets once, by general consent, it no longer Town’s history and its engineering to dominate for a while and that applies to the actual urban problems endeavours were derived from idea gets adjusted and replaced being confronted (Friedmann & several public libraries in the city. The Weaver, 1979: 2). It is then that periodically in direct response to two primary source of information used to the doctrine lying behind prevailing fundamental shifts over time – scale formulate an accurate picture of Cape urban management practices is due and technology. This insight cannot Town’s growth over time was a digital for replacement or major reform. be scientifically proven in the form layer of its land parcels, obtained However, until such moments of of hypothesis – refutation, only online from the Council’s DataPortal, crisis arise, urban development proposed as an interpretation made which included old aerial photos and practices remain “normal”, that is from a careful historical reading, maps. Analysing it with respect to without self-doubt about their efficacy thus making a persuasive argument. dates, land-use zoning and spatial or consequences. Paradoxically, at To identify and characterise the extent, and using GIS software moments of “crisis”, less conventional periods, the following method is yielded a set of urban footprints. used: a concept to keep track of views are taken, or original and These were timelined and compared the idea is introduced – in this case refreshing policy reformulations quantitatively, from which could ‘urban management’. The raw are tabled (Kuhn, 1970: 77-79). be inferred the pace and nature of material against which to deduce change in terms of land development. such changes was then lined up, with greater Cape Town offering the Council Minutes held in the case material. In respect of scale, Planning Library, in 44 Wale Street,
Dominant urban
management doctrine pre-1800 1810s 1820s 1830s 1840s 1850s 1860s 1870s 1880s 1890s 1900s 1910s 1920s 1930s 1940s 1950s 1960s 1970s 1980s 1990s 2000s 2010s 2020s 2030s 2040s
Corporate management Crisis Abandoned
Policed self-help Adopted Crisis Superceded
Public works & servicing Adopted Crisis Superceded
Town planning era Adopted Crisis Superceded
Up-scaling Adopted Crisis Superceded
Transformation Adopted Crisis? Data points -
demographic & spatial 1900 1920 1940 1960 1980 2000 2020
Figure 1: Dominant urban management doctrines Source: Author’s own 66 Jens Kuhn • Changing urban management doctrines in Cape Town, South Africa
Cape Town, as well as data from was regarded as the major urban any historic aerial photographs the Statistics SA website were problems of the day, and the best (City of Cape Town Imagery, 2019) reviewed. This allowed a verification remedies. It also gave a sense of available close to the year. of whether the said areas were, in when public sentiment believed an Using the footprints, ‘counts’ of the fact, under discussion or dispute at urban crisis was at hand. A tie-back number of erven added per 20- the expected dates. It also confirmed between quantitative changes, on the year increment were made, which the role of the public sector in the one hand, and perspective changes, also gave the number of hectares greater picture of urban development. on the other, was then undertaken consumed by each increment. Using A check with the official censuses to identify, characterise and date the land-use zoning map for Cape was made to verify the observed urban management practices for Town (City of Cape Town – Zoning, rises and declines of urban growth Cape Town over the past 250 years. 2019), properties were divided by comparing them to demographic Figure 1 gives a graphic overview of into residential, commercial/retail, trends. Hard copies were used for the the six distinct urban management and industrial properties. Again, period prior to 1960. The Statistics eras identified as a result. this gave a count, but also the SA website allowed for the mining The periods are held together by a hectares consumed per land use, of data in various ways and years. ‘common sense’ or a consensual for each growth increment. The Another useful publication was that understanding of what is to be done tables and numbers given in the text by the Institute of Race Relations, in urban settlements. Consensus below are drawn from this effort. giving information tables on and discord are established economics and population post-1960. Included in ‘residential’ are through dialogue. Each period is neighbourhood amenities such In the knowledge that the above, characterised by a ‘normal practice’. as parks, schools, libraries and specifically the digital land parcel For purposes of this study, all clinics. However, ‘residential’ information, relates only to the information was arranged into excludes higher order uses such formal growth, an ever-increasing 20-year intervals or increments. It as bulk infrastructure installations, share of urban growth is informal, was found that urban management being treatment plants, solid waste i.e. not regulated. To cover this, a doctrines endured for roughly 40 precincts, airports, and the like. This digital information layer based on a years, after which they remained implies that the quantities presented municipal study, called the Informal part of the cognitive landscape. are ‘lean’. Yet they remain significant, Settlements Assessment 2018, They were, however, replaced i.e. representative of the city as a was obtained from Council. By by a new, more modern outlook whole. Major space-extensive land good fortune, starting back in 1993, on city-making practices. uses such as the peninsula mountain shack counts from aerial photos are A footprint of the urban extent for available for the city. This information reserve and vast tracks of rural several years starting in 1900 was supplemented the spatial and aspatial land have been excluded from the generated. For footprints of the year growth estimates given below.1 analysis, since they would distort 1900 and 1920, the author relied on the figures. Moreover, they are not A list of technological innovations various historic maps and written part of the General Plans (or urban was also prepared in an attempt to village profiles. The footprints for subdivisional) information set. An date their introduction and diffusion 1940, 1960, 1980 and 2000 relied error margin of +/- 2% on all space into the urban system of Cape Town. on precise material, that being the estimates must be allowed for. The way in which the elements Surveyor General’s cadastral layer. Since 1993, the municipality has interconnect was noted throughout, A digital clip from the layer for each kept a dataset of informal areas, as was their interplay with regional year was made: “the cadastral tracking their growing circumference and global forces. However, a system has proved to be robust, even and recording shack numbers (City simple bookmarking of periods through a period of major change. of Cape Town, 2017). These served based on quantitative changes of, The technical and institutional as input data for estimates on this say, population or physical growth characteristics of the cadastral theme. Information for earlier periods is inadequate. Problems expressed survey and land registration system relied on ad hoc research studies and actions taken by the people (in South Africa) have survived and municipal surveys over the of the times, whether in the press, radical social, political and economic years, as given in the references. academia or political realms, would transformation. Even though the be the more convincing as markers legitimacy of the surveying and Deeds Office information shows of attitudinal changes, or non-change registration system was challenged when a parcel of land (an erf) was as the case may be. To generate during the transition from apartheid registered in an owner’s name for the a sense of the changes in outlook to democracy, the fundamental very first time, hence becoming ‘real’ among urban actors, municipal technical characteristics of the in Cape Town’s geography. General minutes, press clips, historical system remain unchanged” (Barry, Plans (G-Ps), being the layout and writings and publications were also 2004: 202). As a verification exercise, subdivision plan, contain in their title reviewed, giving a feel for what each footprint was corroborated the year in which they were approved
1 An effort was made to identify such growth against the 1:50 000 map sheets by the Surveyor General, and these from much older photos. (Surveys & Mapping, 2019) and date back to the 1840s. A lag is 67 SSB/TRP/MDM 2021 (78) present between the two dates, but suburbanisation or high-density Warders would fine and punish their sequence is always similar: G-P living, before they shall materialise. offenders (Picard, 1968: 31-38). dates must be earlier and, in a small Perhaps the earliest type of urban Policed self-help, which to date percentage of cases, registration management practised at the Cape seemed the only obvious way to dates may never materialise. can be described as a form of manage a settlement, continued. It Combining the two sources and corporate management, whereby the started running into trouble in the sequencing them allowed for a Vereenigde Oostindische Compagnie early 1840s, a decade in which picture of physical growth phases to (VOC) oversaw settlement growth, Table Valley experienced a spurt of emerge. Since physical expansion is much like a company would ‘own’ and population growth, fuelled, on the typically associated with significant control its territory for purposes of one hand, by the final emancipation moments of population or economic resource protection and extraction.2 of slaves in 1838 (Bank, 1991), many growth and change, the author turns People and livestock would be owned to urban history to find a suitable of whom gravitated to employment or employed, land allocated, and starting point. 1900 was such a year, in the major centre of trade activity – any construction commissioned or when the city’s population surged. the harbour. On the other hand, with authorised. A prime instance of this It also happened to be a year with the increased volume of agricultural attitude would be when the VOC good quantitative information. To produce from the wider district allocated plots along the Liesbeek prepare a long range growth profile, channelling through the port, a more River in Rondebosch to several 20-year intervals were adopted. permanent class of resident sought burgers and set them ‘free’ from This gave a uniform time line and to settle in Table Valley (Bank, 1991). company employ. As demand for allows for increment comparison. fresh vegetables, fuel and especially The population increase triggered Intriguingly, years 1920, 1940, 1960, meat increased, so the frontiers the first round of Cape Town’s and 1980 also coincided with change would be pushed out ever further expansion. The sudden demand for events, whether technological or (Sleigh, 2004: 129-245). The VOC new homes was seized by a section political, as narrated below. accordingly directed the creation of of the newly emerging commercial Buiteposte as agricultural supply class. They were unwittingly aided 3. CAPE TOWN URBAN centres, which, in time, served to by the ‘normalising’ economy. MANAGEMENT determine regional movement routes Under the VOC, which was de facto DOCTRINES and nodes, from Swellendam to government, bank and an enterprise Gaanzekraal (Sleigh, 2004: 129-245). in its own right, the domestic 3.1 Urban management as The majority view was that public economy was always going to be 3 self-help well-being is closely associated with stunted. At the start of its second spending on military defences. occupation, the British introduced Urban management is frequently a raft of favourable economic associated purely with municipal At the close of VOC-rule 150 years reforms, including currency reform, (and state) administration (Baclija, later, this attitude had changed banking, and a shares/stock-trading 2011: 137). Used more broadly in completely (Laidler, 1952: 207). facility, that being the Commercial this instance, it is taken to refer to the By 1800, an outlook that may be Exchange in Adderley Street process of producing and operating described as “policed self-help” (Immelman, 1955). Making matters urban regions, encompassing all prevailed. The Kaapse Vleck even more conducive, the colonial those activities playing a role in had grown into a settlement authorities injected considerable building and maintaining urban – Table Valley. It was fairly sums of cash into the fledgling but environments. That would include independent of the VOC by then money-starved Cape economy acts performed or omitted by and considerably bigger. A ward by compensating slave owners government departments, the private master census of 1801 placed in cash (Bank, 1991: 194-195). construction and finance sectors, the population of the peninsula as well as popular movements. at 16 531 (Laidler, 1952: 207). For the first time, the preconditions Importantly, it would also extend to were in place for urban growth to be Families would collect their water beliefs held by civil society, regulators driven by enterprise rather than by from the publicly supplied fountains; and policymakers in respect of how government. The settlement spread solid waste and night soil had to be and who ought to run urban areas. swiftly towards Signal Hill and Green dealt with privately; clearing paths Producing urban environments Point, and thereafter in the direction in front of one’s house or shop takes place under rather specific of Tamboerskloof (Davies, 1965: must be undertaken daily; fire- conditions, with technology being 6-7). The fastest and poorest growth protection measures in houses were one of the most powerful forces precinct was that of District 6 (then regulated, and so on. All this was setting the tone for what is possible known as District 12, and Kanala enforced by the precinct “warders” and what the spatial outcome will Dorp) (Day & Son Lithographers, (Picard, 1968: 31-38). Municipal be. Factors such as the nature of 1854). It accommodated some 4 000 functions centred on regulation and the economy, that is, issuing the enforcement rather than on delivery. 3 Author’s own view that being both a requisite finance and savings, must government and a profit-seeking company is find a match in the market for, say, 2 Author’s own view. problematic. 68 Jens Kuhn • Changing urban management doctrines in Cape Town, South Africa individuals by 1850. It doubled in owners (imposing in other ways on being a local authority’s raison d’être. size in ten years but was built mostly landlords, too) and to encourage it With that, the new view of urban without sewers, a direct water supply, to undertake huge new public works management as large-scale public or any measures regarding storm (Bickford-Smith, 1983: 198-199). works, empowered local authorities, water. This laid the foundations for and service provision had been firmly In opposition to merchants, an a first ‘urban crisis’. In poorer areas embedded in public consciousness.4 organised and influential class of such as District 6, solid waste would landlords had also formed. They Yet no sooner had the new method accumulate mid-block behind the tended to be from and allied to of urban management found its feet rows of rental tenements lining the the local commercial business and the ground beneath would shift. streets (Day & Son Lithographers, establishment (Bickford-Smith, Another spike in population growth 1854). The problem was not 1983: 196; Dommisse, 2011: 34- occurred in roughly 1900 (Van confined to District 6. Not since the 42). They predictably rebuffed the Heyningen, 1984: 64). Over and early 1800s, under architect Louis merchant Reformers. Reading the above any natural increases, growth Thibault, was much appetite for civic press of the day explains that the at this time was supplemented by improvement shown (De Puyfontaine, debate crystallised into two broad an influx of non-returning British 1972: 27-32). Indeed, until 1840, factions: those in favour of “reform” soldiers active during the Boer there was no meaningful municipality. and those labelled by Reformers War (Van Heyningen, 1984: 64). Once one was founded, it was taken as the “Dirty Party” (Dommisse, Moreover, uitlander refugees from the up with arguments over who should 2011: 34-42). Ultimately, the latter Transvaal moved south, immigrants enforce street-cleaning regulations – did take control of council in early from eastern Europe’s pogroms the police or the municipal warders. 1880, but by then landlords were arrived, and farm labourers from a Urban management, as policed also versed in the challenges depressed agricultural sector at the self-help, dragged on through the facing town. The “Dirty Party” would time all added to the increase (Van decades, but it was increasingly henceforth regard itself as the “Clean Heyningen, 1984: 64). In a matter of out of step with the changed Party” (Dommisse, 2011: 34-42). ten years, the Peninsula’s population circumstances. By the mid-1870s, doubled, which would have had the problem of filth and untidiness 3.2. Urban management as the knock-on effect of creating a at Table Valley had become the public works huge demand for accommodation dominant topic in municipal politics. For the next four decades and and employment again. Waste from fishing operations well into the 1910s, considerable The earliest signs of overcrowding remained on the beaches; sewerage improvements to Cape Town would were felt most acutely on lower poured down into the sea along be made, particularly with reference priced houses and lodgings. Demand mostly open channels; manufacturing to utility amenities. Several water- pushed rentals up significantly; waste from tanning, slaughtering or supply reservoirs were built; pipes landlordism as a business had cooking were all taken, or washed, laid; streets and rail stations lit; open exhausted itself (Warren, 1988: 44). down to the tides to clear up sewers covered (water-borne in The formation of slums and dreadful (Bradlow, 1976: 1). Artisans would 1895); main thoroughfares hardened; living conditions drew the authorities’ practise their skills and production the harbour extended several times, ire. Instinctively, they pressed at home, including from their small, and water reticulation introduced proprietors into making costly crowded tenements, in which (Palser, 1998: 11-15). In fact, in the improvements, while tenants were candle-making, fish-cleaning, sewing, 1890s, the municipal corporation increasingly reluctant or unable to baking and much else took place. even generated its first electricity pay. Unlike with civic improvements, Visitors to the colony would all from the Molteno Reservoir (Palser, however, urban management was pass through the port that was 1998: 11-15). Benefits from these now being drawn into the private thus exposed to the unsavoury enhancements were far from evenly realm – a field in which they remained condition of town. Comments such spread across town, of course, with inexperienced and insecure. as “a somewhat ragged place”, poorer housing areas receiving less The private sector was more “city of slums” and “city of stinks” of the spend. Yet the era wherein responsive to the new demand. were frequently noted in the press the municipality took on functions A new commercial undertaking (Bickford-Smith, 1983: 194-196). such as central water management, emerged, one based on home The first salvo for a major reform solid-waste collections, controlled ownership and on loan finance, was launched by a group of abattoirs, traffic management, and ‘land subdivision’. Starting in wealthy merchants. They generally public transport, among other things, the mid-1890s, a large-scale lived out of town in the salubrious had begun. A new ‘normal practice’ subdivision of open terrain began.5 peninsula, yet were confronted in urban management had set in. by their customers’ reaction. They As the new century opened, the 4 Author’s own reading/interpretation of pressed for reforms in favour of civic civic-spirited side of the municipal the changed attitude to managing urban settlements. improvements. Their solution was to system had improved conditions 5 Author’s own conclusion after inspecting the afford the municipality much greater significantly, so much so that it had maps and the cadastras and confirmation in lending powers, to tax property become the norm to think of it as the newspaper advertisements. 69 SSB/TRP/MDM 2021 (78)
The South Africa Review routinely station”, “generously sized lots”, and its own jurisdiction. This made it carried advertisements offering “suitable for vegetable gardening”. difficult to connect to existing service “building-lots” for sale (erf/plot) or This phase of urban expansion in networks, to collect property taxes, auction, often with maps (South Cape Town remained unguided by as there were no prior valuations, Africa Review, 1901: 8; 1902: 9, 22). any spatial framework, nor was it or to anticipate the volumes and These were usually outside the centrally controlled. Territories being range of municipal servicing being jurisdiction of existing municipalities,6 opened up took their cue firmly from generated. Furthermore, connecting but not out of reach either. Prominent, pre-existing networks: stations, roads two new “estates” properly, even but not limited to, were locations such and water mains (see Figure 2). when adjoining each other, proved as Milnerton, Goodwood, Parow, tricky. A new mechanism to ensure From the outset, administrative Diep River and even Sea Point. co-ordination and regulation of urban deficiencies in this process were Land subdivision opened the said development was urgently needed. recorded. The Cape Colony’s areas up for future development, The term “proper town planning” kept “Mayors Congresses” repeatedly by simply imposing a grid on the surfacing (Rosenthal, 1957: 75). landscape and demarcating plots raised the problem of what it termed of land. Hardly any attention was “town lands”, being the complications Stemming largely from the United paid to layout planning or internal caused by “estate developments” or Kingdom, Cape Town’s councillors servicing (Rosenthal, 1980b: 28). “vendors of townships”. Land was and mayors drew heavily on Land was commodified and this being surveyed without notifying the exposure to solutions discussed new ‘business’ was still distinct from municipality, even when falling inside abroad. Urban management would the home-building process. Viewed jointly, the two processes amounted to a significant spatial expansion of urban Cape Town (Young, 1998: 18). The subdivision of land constituted the first wave of suburbanisation into the Peninsula. By 1925, it had tripled the urban footprint of the city with knock-on effects for water supply and sewerage services. The subdivision of land was capital intensive. Much of it came from the Witwatersrand via the Randlords (Yudelman, 1984: 52). Mining, it was thought, was coming to a close, since, by 1900, mines were getting deeper, requiring specialist skills and yet yielding less ore (Yudelman, 1984: 52). ‘Gentlemen estates’ on the southern Peninsula and farms on ‘the downs’ were thus bought up as investments. Gradually, the process of carving them up for settlement gained traction. The subdivision of land did follow a spatial logic. Greater Cape Town’s trunk routes, rails and roads had by and large been inscribed on its geography. Since the private motor car had not become a domestic convenience yet, access to public transport lines was essential for the sale of new residential plots. Advertisements of the time (in the South Africa Review) all proclaim: “within easy walking distance to the
6 In 1910, roughly 13 municipalities existed within the Cape Town area. By 1994, 37 Figure 2: Urban Extent in 1920 municipal authorities were in place, covering what is currently the Metro jurisdiction. Source: Generated by author 70 Jens Kuhn • Changing urban management doctrines in Cape Town, South Africa henceforth require a leading lamp. (1919) and the “Houses in Brick” Milnerton Estates appointed a It was hoped that things would (1925) were in response to very qualified town planner, A.J.L. get better if directed by long- local crises. Retreat, Kensington Thompson, to make the 20-year-old range master plans. Meanwhile, Estate, Brooklyn, Crawford and plans more appealing. He offered it was doctrine-as-usual, while Claremont saw the building of such model building plans, reoriented living conditions in town steadily structures. In the coming years, this vistas towards the seaside and worsened. The Housing Survey would be expanded so much so that proposed the planting of trees along of 1932 by the Medical Officer of the impression was cemented in all roads (Rosenthal, 1980a: 56). Health served before council. It popular thinking that municipalities Pinelands Estate, which laid its looked into the “central portions of are responsible welfare housing foundation stone in 1919, was Cape Town”, being wards 2 and 6, (Cape Town Municipality, 1923: 7). modelled on the British “Garden City” movement. The Citizens and recommended the “eradication The first phase of Maitland Garden Housing League produced elaborate of slums on a systematic basis” Village (138 units) was begun in layouts in their Good Hope Model and that a development “scheme 1918, after having been a refuge Village schemes in Brooklyn should be adopted” (Cape Town for the ill during the influenza of and Ruiterwacht. Furthermore, Municipality, 1933: 105). that year. Relocating out of town landholding companies such as was but an echo of what private Designating the precincts around the Elsies River Land & Estate developers had been doing for Van de Leur and Caledon streets as Syndicate (Pty) or the Plattekloof some time. A second scheme was “slum”, “overcrowded” or “unsanitary” Estate & Investment Company begun in Roeland Street, Vredehoek, lead logically to the idea that (Pty) took advantage of a now in 1921 (48 units). Both came municipalities should do more than well-capitalised building society with elaborate urban designs. co-ordinate developments. They had system (Boleat, 1985: 130) to to get directly involved in forestalling The prevailing doctrine of public provide not only “lots in the field”, urban decline. In this instance, works was no longer up to the task but also serviced erven and building councillors adopted slogans, of dealing with such challenges. finance. This appealed to both solutions and attitudes derived from In the early 1920s, the majority of homeowners and property investors. the United Kingdom, which generally commentators viewed the ideal Consequently, Goodwood grew favoured turning their backs on of ‘town planning’ favourably phenomenally in the early 1940s. Its squalid inner parts of town, preferring (Rosenthal, 1957), associating it population rose from 6 800 people to have them cleared and relocated with technological revolutions such in 1939 to 28 800 in 1945, doubling to properly planned areas, where as railroads or electricity, both of again to 60 000 by 1950, with the “layouts allowed for light, air and which came a generation earlier majority of growth being Coloured space, and with overcrowding being and had a massive impact on families. “Estate development” overcome” (Rosenthal, 1957: 75). Cape Town’s form. Town planning had become the vehicle of choice After reading the dates from the instilled optimism, confidence for township establishment and General Plan approval dates, the and enthusiasm. With it too came building (Rosenthal, 1980b: 17). strains of utopia and ambition. number-of-units from the erven A section of the architectural created on them, and the mention fraternity also took a keen interest 3.3 Urban management as town of these areas in Council debates, in the ‘new field’ of town planning. planning the author found that the earliest In 1938, the Architectural Society housing scheme was by the By the early 1920s, the subdivision convened a Congress on the Mowbray Board, which built a few process had largely run its course. Science of Town Planning, using houses along Raapenberg Road It had flooded the market with plots, Cape Town’s Foreshore reclamation in 1903. This was followed by which was compounded by the scheme as a case study, convened Cape Town’s Mill Street project in post-war depression. Inspecting at Eskom House in Johannesburg. 1904. Like larger companies were the historical cadastra of Cape Psychologists and sociologists also doing at the time, these were built Town illustrates that the large tracts weighed in on this exciting subject for their own lower salaried staff. of land subdivided in the 1900s, (Architectural Students Society, But it did signal Council’s entry especially in locations such as 1938). Such debates influenced into real-estate development. Kraaifontein, Milnerton or Elsies public sector housing schemes River, had not been taken up. When such as Alicedale (1940), which In 1916, Council approved an internal economic recovery did come later sought to “create community” 10-year fund to allow for the erection in the decade, emphasis fell on through spatial designs, or of “wood and iron” dwellings, to home-building. Underpinning the Q-Town (1944), with its high-rise be removed on 6 months’ notice7. renewed momentum was town flats in wide open landscape. Emergency shelter works such as planning and a growing population. the “Assisted Housing Program” The impact of the ‘town planning The private sector revisited its grid ideal’ on the role of the state was 7 In 1913, eight municipalities on the Peninsula amalgamated into one Council (Worden, Van layouts with more imagination and fundamentally legislative. As early Heyningen & Bickford-Smith, 1999: 46). offered direct consumer support. as the 1910s, Dr Charles Porter of 71 SSB/TRP/MDM 2021 (78)
Johannesburg, a medical doctor, burst of growth starting in roughly aspect of an urban management was called upon to impose some 1940 (Nattrass, 1990). As a useful doctrine. Working back, older areas order on the unruly and fast-growing milestone, this was when, for the were to be proclaimed and “cleaned” town. His zeal for town planning first time, manufacturing contributed (Western, 2000) as part of this was rooted in his desire for hygiene, more to the national gross domestic attitude, which added artificially to a order and de-densification. His product than the agricultural or housing shortage among, especially, preferred means of municipal mining sectors (Wilkinson, 1993: the Coloured community. Making legislation was the attitude of control. 241). Making that more impressive matters worse, local government is that mining output had grown from itself was being racialised, with Table 1: Population growth in £45 million in 1930 to £118 million councillors of colour being pushed 20-year intervals in 1940 (Samuels, 1960: 241). The out and their voices going unheard. Population 80 000 restructuring economy found spatial Private sector development was in 1900 Growth factor expression in the building of industrial self-consciously building for Whites Periods Total estates such as Epping 1 (1943) in only. It was a significant departure in 1920 221 000 2.7 the Cape, thus attracting unskilled in attitude from the days when the in 1940 398 000 1.8 labourers (Nattrass, 1990: 107). Diep River or Goodwood plots were in 1960 806 600 2.0 The Peninsula’s African population first put out to sale in the 1920s. in 1980 1 603 500 2.05 rose dramatically in the five-year Public sector housing projects period from 16 500 to 60 000. That In 2000 2 801 000 1.75 grew in size, seeking economies swelled squatter settlements of in 2020 (Est.) 4 100 000 1.45 of scale and speed by delivering Windemere, Vrygrond, Hardevlei, not 100 or 200 units at a time, Sources: This profile was assembled from Retreat and Philippi. Squatting would, but several hundred such as in various sources (South Africa, Bureau in turn, redirect policy attention Hazendal (1956) and Bridgetown of Census & Statistics, 1960: A-12; to emergency relief, that is away (1952). Taken together with other Institute of Race Relations, 2014: 23, 29; from higher density housing. Dorrington, 2005: 36; Statistics SA, 1991; schemes such as Heideveld, Athlone 2001; 2011) (Minor adjustments made to The ‘native township’ of Langa and Lotus River, not to mention account for changing municipal and census was started in 1925 – the first of schemes on the Peninsula by the geographies/demarcations). several to come. Funded from the Divisional Council in Gassy Park new revenue account of the Native and Lavender Hill, some 6 000 ha of The Union Government deemed Urban Areas Act (1923), it stands as urban landscape was added to Cape it more appropriate for provincial possibly the earliest pure race-based Town between 1920 and 1960 via governments to manage township scheme in the Cape. Other schemes public sector initiative (see Table 2). establishment. Transvaal introduced such as Boundary Road in Rugby Town planning had, of course, been its Townships & Town Planning (1942) or CAFDA Village in Retreat commandeered to “group-area” cities Ordinance in 1931, while the Cape (1952) were begun with poverty in from its beginnings (Parnell, 1993: followed with its Ordinance in 1933. mind, that is, until national funding 97). By the 1960s, its involvement Both called on municipalities to was made conditional upon them had deeply eroded its reputation, draft ‘town planning schemes’, notwithstanding the many critics of being classified in terms of the Group being frameworks to mitigate slum the system within the fraternity. Areas Act (South Africa, 1950) for formation and urban ill-health. Thus Whites and Coloureds, respectively. Perhaps because the adoption began a long tradition of classifying Reluctantly, the City Council of planning was to deal with and categorising building activity. acceded and so starts the notion of uncoordinated development and Administrative procedure, land-use developing for specified race groups. urban health challenges of the rights and building control became By the late 1960s, it was received time, it completely missed the fields in their own right. It became as ‘normal’, making it an integral other technological innovation of ever more elaborate and costly until 1960. Floyd (1960: 104-135) gives a detailed account of how this all Table 2: Urban expansion in 20-year intervals functioned without explicitly venturing Built by 1900 1 166 1 166 to suggest whether initial urban Urban expansion in Growth periods Growth factor Urban extent in ha problems calling for the adoption of hectares town planning had been ameliorated Added by 1920 1 196 1.03 2 362 by planning legislation or not. Added by 1940 4 683 1.98 7 045 While ideas from Britain of higher Added by 1960 4 265 0.61 11 310 density rental tenements in town Added by 1980 15 420 1.36 26 730 such as at Wells Square (1933) Added by 2000 19 027 0.71 45 757 and Bloemhof Flats (1938) in the Added by 2020 14 090 0.31 59 847 City Bowl were introduced, they remained marginal to the greater Source: Author’s own calculations, using GIS software and information sets, as explained in challenge brought on by a renewed the methodology 72 Jens Kuhn • Changing urban management doctrines in Cape Town, South Africa the early 1920s – the automobile. engineering and routing aspects, in virtue set in. At a theoretical level, Often referred to as the ‘revolution in particular. The negligeable attention some academics (Architectural transport’, it would leave a lasting and paid to their relationship with Students Society, 1938) proposed massive impression on physical Cape communities or aesthetic impact on paying attention to public sector Town. Once cars made themselves the landscape was taken as positive. decision processes rather than felt as problems, urban management Freeway construction characterised to “master plans” as an effective sought to accommodate them. Cape Town of the 1960s and 1970s route to improving cities (Faludi, In 1929, the Council, through the (Floor, 1984). Ever more capacious 1973). At a practical level, urban office of the City Engineer, Mr D E roads were assumed to be a best growth can be characterised as Lloyd-Davies, and drawing on his response to our high levels of car having become explosive as of the experience in public works, would ownership – even by American early 1960s (compare Figures 3 lobby for a national road system, standards. But the dissenting voices and 6). Construction technologies proposing to start with the building grew louder. In 1961, the British changed significantly, allowing for of freeways in metropolitan areas town planner, Sir William Holford much higher buildings and off-site (Floor, 1984: 2). The deep-seated (1961: 36), would suggest that the assembly methods (Hartdegen, belief was that “roads build wealth; devastation wrought on American 1981: 267). Spatially, the country’s wealth does not build roads”. Until and European cities by the motor metropolitan areas were already on the verge of being too spread out to the mid-1930s, government still car could still be prevented in Cape operate without transport subsidies, viewed the rail system as the future Town, where its physical heritage was since 1957 saw the introduction of transport. It ultimately accepted already under threat. He noted that it of a commuter bus subsidy. a financing obligation in respect of would require thinking as radical as roads, especially of the intercity kind. the transport revolution itself was. Infrastructure schemes by the public sector took on regional Cape Town of the 1950s was gripped As planning became publicly dimensions such as the Voëlvlei by freeway planning – their civil contested, despondency about its and Wemmershoek (with its hydro- electric component) dams. Within the metropolitan area, four major freeways would be built over the next 30 years, as well as a new 180mW power station at Athlone (Palser, 1998). In fact, regional planning was widely punted as more appropriate to the impending ‘population explosion’ as then anticipated worldwide. Planning should concentrate on the region rather than on the town. By the 1960s, the region as object of planning had penetrated every department of the state – national censuses were premised on both planning regions and planning units.
3.4 Urban management as upscaling The year 1960 again triggered profound political and economic changes in the country. No aspect of society remained untouched by the protests in Sharpeville and Langa in March 1960 (Lodge, 2011). They capped a decade of rising urban protest and repression. It would not leave urban management unaltered. Coloured voters were removed from the voters’ roll in the Cape. Multiracial liberal parties were outlawed, and their leaders went into exile or “underground” Figure 3: Urban extent in 1960 (Lodge, 2011). Economic ties with Source: Author’s own the Commonwealth were severed 73 SSB/TRP/MDM 2021 (78) and the Rand was introduced as firmly in place throughout. They structure. They also generated the currency (Lodge, 2011). Electricity would only let up in the 1990s. As self-confidence required to move was of the cheapest in the world; the was the case with water, sewerage, matters up a notch, to even grander Industrial Development Corporation’s road or electricity schemes, initiatives in future – completely initiatives to foster manufacturing in homelessness would henceforth new towns (see Table 3). the 1940s had reached maturity; an be addressed on a massive scale In 1972, Cape Town Municipality abundant variety of natural resources and with a positivist attitude. was available. In combination, (1972) contemplated building a ‘new This ‘reset’ may best be traced to these factors set the scene for town’ on the Cape Flats. The idea a moment when the various local what would become a decade of was to shed the stigma of ‘low cost’ initiatives in Retreat were combined unequalled annual growth, at a associated with prevailing public and reframed as a long-range rate of 6%. The situation caused sector building efforts. Mitchell’s Plain 8 deep pessimism and optimism in scheme. Drawing on the Municipal (1975-1987 ), or ‘Good Hope’ as was equal measure. Urban management Minutes of 1954: “The [Retreat] first mooted, was a proposal to build adopted grander and altogether more Master Plan ... should serve as a ... 40 000 houses along with all ancillary expensive undertakings. Without housing programme for the coloured social facilities, mortgage houses and doubt, between 1960 and 2000, population for the next 10 years in enough streetscape for everyone’s Cape Town would experience its a systematic and scientific attempt motor car (Huchzermeyer, 1995). biggest physical expansion ever. to solve this acute problem” (Cape Shortly thereafter, the Divisional The city grew from 11 300 ha to 45 Town Municipality, 1954: 104). The Council began its ‘new town’ on a 700 ha of urban space, a stellar shortage was estimated to be 20 000 farm up the West Coast. Atlantis enlargement! (see Table 2). houses and a delivery rate would be (1978-1991) came with its own 1 500 per year. As noted from the industrial estate, visible on maps and Table 3: ‘New towns’ in Cape Town cadastras and municipal minutes of 8 Technically, there is no “end date”, but the New towns in the time, a few more programmes Planned scale As-built scale official programme closed during 1975-1987. Cape Town were subsequently started, notably This is when Mitchells Plain, or iSLP, for Mitchell’s Plain 2 800ha 3 400ha Bonteheuwel and Kalksteenfontein, instance, was no longer financed as a Units 40 000 54 400 programme. But infill development continues but this did not solve homelessness, to this day, as these are part of the geography Khayelitsha 1 700ha 2 700ha but left a lasting imprint on city of Cape Town. Units 38 500 53 100
Atlantis 1 300ha 1 050ha
Units 12 000 10 300
iSLP 2 700ha 1 750ha
Units 45 000 64 200
Sources: See South African Government (1979) for Mitchell’s Plain; Taylor (1989) for Khayelitsha; iSLP Close-out Report (2005) for the iSLP
Inferred in the context of the Retreat master plan, the public sector contributed significantly to this expansion. By moving away from undertaking single projects in favour of rolling out multiyear housing programmes, what began as a welfare endeavour can, in hindsight, be viewed more properly as an urban building event. This new generation of programmes would consume land and public funds at an increasingly voracious pace. It was taken for granted that urban problems of public health and housing could be conclusively “solved” only if done with the right ambition and more comprehensively. Figure 4: Changing ideas about urban layouts Still, the traits of population and development control remained Source: Author’s own image generated from the GIS cadastral layer 74 Jens Kuhn • Changing urban management doctrines in Cape Town, South Africa old photos. This was followed by an which fed erstwhile market gardens, locations such as Bellville and announcement of yet another one on were disappearing from obvious Claremont. For the first time, the the Cape Flats, this time for Africans. view, much like the Platteklip stream. question of where the core of Cape Khayelitsha (1984-1996) was Much of the Platteklip Stream that Town lay was foggy. Starting in announced by government in 1983 watered the Company Gardens 1989, the redevelopment of the V&A just as the National Party was facing and Castle of the 17th century had Waterfront did much to rescue the its crisis over separate development disappeared. Strandveld Fynbos, CBD commercially, but in its own way (Dewar & Watson, 1984: 1). Violent a unique dune-flora landscape, also demonstrated the appeal to size flare-ups would characterise the flats had been consumed by building and grandiosity. The race to secure between pro- and anti-government (City of Cape Town, 2012a). market share propelled the shopping factions, and most acutely in In all, by 2000, just shy of 10 000 centre process. If one could no longer squatter settlements such as ha of urban development had been draw customers from the suburbs, Crossroads. Government-driven added to Cape Town’s footprint then move out! By the early 2000s, projects became highly politicised. through state initiative – almost a distinct and reasonable smooth Despite all the spending, squatter exclusively south of the N2 freeway. hierarchy of shopping complexes settlements on the Peninsula In that time, the private real-estate had crystallised, topped perhaps continued to swell. Maintaining such sector turned its attention to rolling by Century City in ostentation. levels of spend on these ventures out suburban residential townships, Centres were distributed across the became highly politicised and ever bigger shopping centres, and metropolitan economy, yet areas financially onerous. Economically, industrial estates. These would all built by the public sector remained the 1980s were the antithesis of the be built with the private automobile largely outside this process, although 1960s, with low growth rates and a firmly in mind, and perforce, for not absolutely so. They remained record national debt being reached the White section of society. Both strongly attached to informal trade. by 1989 (Abedian & Standish, 1992: private and public developments Main-road shopping strips were in 13). As it was risky to withdraw from as of 1960 could and did disregard decline everywhere to be replaced housing delivery at that time, a new historic movement routes. Rail by neighbourhood shopping centres. product had to be considered. In the extensions were added as part of Inferred from layouts and old photos, early 1990s, the old Cape Province all new towns, and the freeways the residential ‘estate development’ announced its integrated Serviced opened up most of the historic farms had also taken on an adjusted form – Land Project (iSLP, 2005). The on the Peninsula. Organic urban the erstwhile gridiron had fallen out of purpose was essentially to “improve growth from before the motor car favour to be replaced by experimental the land” with municipal services had given way to the programmatic layouts. Curvilinear roads and before being squatted upon. The growth of the modern era. By the cul-de-sacs as key features notion of supplying serviced sites mid-1980s, the combination of were introduced, while elevated at scale was endorsed and the new spread and mobility gave the city landscapes with views were made town idea began to fade. The one a new commercial sector – the taxi desirable. Motives included slowing aspect of the idea, which never business (Khosa, 1991: 310). succeeded, was the town centre. traffic, engendering community, The private sector’s contribution In each case, land set aside for a and making movement visually to building the city was massive. ‘CBD’ remained vacant the longest. more appealing (see Figure 3). From 1960 to 2000, it added The iSLP (1992-2005) serviced land close to 12 000 ha of new urban Industrial estates entered urban around Nyanga and Crossroads, fabric.9 Most of it was targeted at management consciousness in eventually also incorporating Delft, the White middle class, although the early 1950s (see Figure 4). relocating some 65 000 shack significant portions went to Coloured As the spatial manifestation of the families to plots over a 15-year buyers in Eersteriver, Brackenfell burgeoning manufacturing sector, span. A significant number of plots, and Kuilsriver. Visible on photos, they were viewed as an engine for although not all, were supplied with the major axis of expansion was urban prosperity. With ‘Epping 1’, the a rudimentary house on it after the north-east from Bellville and public sector got involved in making Housing Act (107 of 1997) came north-west from Somerset West. land available for manufacturing, into effect – colloquially, these twinning it with rail as mover of became known as RDP houses. Private sector ambition and scale goods (Cape Town Municipality, is best observed in the building of Collectively, ‘new town’ programmes 1947: 10). A decade later, it will shopping centres. Their number city opened its rural areas up widely. have drawn workers and placed and size rose rapidly in the early They contributed significantly to its municipalities on a policy collision 1970s and, as late as 1985, Cape spread (see Table 3). The Cape course with the state, which desired Town’s CBD (or the City Bowl) could Flats, which in the 1840s could not industrial decentralisation, hence still claim retail primacy. Thereafter, be traversed by wagons for the sandy Atlantis. This new phenomenon matters would change, as ‘malls’ and shifting ground conditions, had began the debate about cities of competitive size sprang up in now been covered with concrete competing. Local government was and bitumen. Natural water courses, 9 Author’s own calculations. now looking beyond its jurisdiction. 75 SSB/TRP/MDM 2021 (78)
Smaller manufacturing centres had in terms of skill and sophistication, 1940s, a renewed influx of particularly always existed on the outskirts would be merged into one Unicity. African migrants was instrumental of towns, from Paarden Eiland, Uniform practices and procedures in starting the Nyanga-Gugulethu which was linked to the City Bowl, across the diverse range of historic scheme (Cape Town Municipality, to Parow Industria. Their location areas – big and small; Black and 1955: 9). Informal shelters, variously of choice was always on the very White; rich and poor – would follow. referred to as ‘hutments’, ‘pondocks’ edge of town on account of their Emblematic of said standardisation is or, nowadays, ‘shacks’ increased in nuisance and risk factor. Once the introduction of an overriding Land number year-on-year and provided embedded in urban management as Use Management System, giving much of the impetus for new state an essential component of any city, an Integrated Zoning Scheme and housing efforts. A second influx their establishment grew in scale single set of Scheme Regulations to Cape Town took place in the and tempo (see Figure 5). Industrial (South Africa, 2012: 8-14). Design 1990s, often ascribed to a decline estates would become not only a of the system coincided with of Eastern Cape homelands. The tangible force for urban expansion, maturing of digital technology and number of shacks increased from but also magnets for investment and has, accordingly, been built on 28 400 in 1993 to 72 300 in 1998 urban development in their direction. the premise that processing of and from 50 recognised settlements development applications will in to 64 (Kuhn, 1999). In 2017, the 3.5. Urban management as future be done on-line. This holds number stood at approximately 152 transformation the prospect of creating the new 000 across 280 locations (City of By the late 1990s, scale had given cleavage in the city, the one between Cape Town, 2017). The variation way to a new dominant ideal – formal and informal procedures. in type and size of settlement has since broadened significantly, while transformation. Subsumed in that Informal settlement is not new to the level of utility service received idea are questions of, among others, Cape Town. It was a complaint as by each also differs markedly. reconstruction, redress, reform, early as the 1920s when, in Fish 10 and restructuring. The decade Hoek, ex-rail construction workers However, a new attitude towards is remembered as the period of built shelters in the dunes. In the such settlements became apparent democratisation, but it should also be viewed as a period of great fluidity and uncertainty, especially at municipal level. In the realms of urban management, attitudes 4 500 were to change fundamentally once Growth in industrial land again. Urban critics of an earlier generation moved into positions of Cape Town 4 000 influence – the city system was to be integrated rather than segregated, 3 500 densified rather than spread, and Hectares governance was to be participative added rather than technicist (McLagan & 3 000 Nel, 1997). The results of these shifts Hectares total in attitude have yielded a mixed bag thus far, as picked up below. 2 500 2 169.8 Centralisation, standardisation and informalisation are key aspects of 2 000 the new transformation era, and are germane to urban management. 1 452.4 1 500 The democratic Constitution of the Republic of South Africa came into effect in 1996. Only five 1 000 years later, the municipal system would settle into final form. Initial 634.6 attempts to create six autonomous 500 municipalities for the metropolitan 40.0 101.9 area failed when, in 2001, all 3 million 0 residents fell under a single council 1960 1980 2000 of 210 representatives (Unicity 1940 2018 Commission, 2000). Once in place, the ex-administrations, very diverse FigureFigure 5: 5: Increase in industrialin industrial land (calculated land (calculated from land zonedfrom asland ‘Industry’) zoned as ‘Industry’)
10 Author’s own interpretation. Source:Source: Author’sAuthor’s own own 76 Jens Kuhn • Changing urban management doctrines in Cape Town, South Africa post-2000. Their value to those new doctrine, the public sector was way of formalising settlement was who lived in and built them was forced into a position whereby it to relax building control regulations admitted. Prevailing wisdom was that is always on the back-foot, trying over deemed ‘illegal’ building. spontaneous settlements were not to to service and formalise new There have been attempts to be demolished or relocated, except settlements as and where they arose. accommodate informality in the in cases of danger to occupants. This weakened the role of official town planning schemes, ironic The permissive attitude led to their city planning significantly. A return though it may sound. In existing proliferation. They thus became to organic growth was in progress. suburbs, building second and third a factor in urban management dwellings has been allowed as a One way of formalising the itself – no longer as a problem matter of primary right as another of urban welfare, but as a force settlements remained the continued way of minimising the pressures in directly shaping the evolving building of new housing stock (City for new informal area formation. structure and nature of physical of Cape Town, 2012b). Of the 43 Cape Town. Informality had become 000 state-funded houses built in Informal settlements contributed a city-building process in its own Cape Town between 1999 and hardly anything to urban spread. As right, alongside the traditional state 2004, 39 000 went to families living far as absolute expansion goes, and development schemes and private in shacks in informal areas, only to in proportional terms, urban growth real-estate investment. Under this be re-occupied by others. A second has slowed considerably since 2000. Only 14 000 ha had been added by 2020 to the base of 45 700 ha (see Table 2). But the contribution made by new informal areas was minimal on account of being positioned in and around existing urban fabric rather than behind dunes in far- flung locations. Currently, 2 100 ha of Cape Town’s urban space is informal (City of Cape Town, 2017). Public-sector programmes of earlier decades had also changed. Projects were back on the agenda, and most of these were mop-up operations within legacy programmes, thereby not contributing a great deal to urban spread either. Without new town ideals as part of their conception, however, state development schemes had lost some crucial aspects. Sociological debates about what house is fit for what kind of family had been neglected in favour of output score-keeping – much in keeping with the information age. More importantly, they remained tethered to the notion of delivering only to the poorest families, who tended to be African. Since project size was championed, large areas of socio-economic disadvantage have been produced. State policy since 1996, primarily through its funding of housing, has dramatically intensified segregation in Cape Town (Tomlinson, 1997). On the other hand, market processes of the property sector have had palpable desegregative effects on many older suburbs and on central shopping areas. Figure 6: Urban extent in 2020 The private sector directed its Source: Author’s own graphic attention to the market, which 77 SSB/TRP/MDM 2021 (78) expanded gradually, in that buyers of macro-economies. Public sector on board as circumstances in from all population groups were schemes shall remain linked to state respect of population, technology permitted to purchase and own funding though, just when national and economics demand it. Earlier property. But the product delivered, governments and their economies outlooks are not wholly discarded, but in general, had also changed. By are diluted. The informal sector is they become adjusted and enriched. 2020, virtually all new residential bound to proceed unresourced. At times, they take on a life of their and business parks were enclosed Urban management shall assume own (e.g. town planning). Earlier 11 as security estates. A premium a split personality. Early attempts practices are normally continued, of as much as 100% could be at predicting ICT’s likely effect on not as a headline item (e.g. charged inside a gated estate urban form and management have public works or housing delivery). compared to one outside. The been made, specifically working These sink imperceptibly into the trend is down to the withdrawal of out the logical result of the “death background as new lead ideas arise effective urban policing, so buyers of distance” (Hall, 1998: 943-989). to confront and communicate what are pricing safety and security into Sadly, this debate has subdued society understands to be the most their purchase of fixed property. since, possibly because attention pressing challenge of the moment. As the city spread, now covering has moved to a preoccupation most of the greater downs/flats with data, “smart cities” and While the urban management territory, land has become more “applications”. As yet, none of doctrine has an effect on the type scarce and valuable. This led to a them are tied back to morphology. and form of city produced, it is further change in the private sector Currently, in 2020, we have another reciprocally possible to read the product – higher densities. Unit moment of crisis. It pivots around prevailing attitudes from the historic densities (du/ha) being delivered three aspects, namely safety and form of that city. In the case of Cape have gone up from a metro average security; a failing state, which Town, the six doctrines identified, 7.7du/ha in the 1980s to 9.7du/ha implicates urban planning, and a namely corporate management, self- at present in the residential sector. Peninsula hemmed in by mountains, help, public works, town planning, which shall impose considerable The combination of scale, security upscaling, and transformation and density are best exemplified limits on its further spread. dominated for a period of roughly in the Sitari development, west of 40 years each. In the middle of Strand, where the largest enclosed 4. CONCLUSION each term, a crisis would arise, estate is taking shape – over 4 000 changing the cognitive rules whereby homes. 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