South African cities were during the apartheid era built with separated areas
for different groups of the society and residential segregation is one of the
legacies left by the apartheid regime. The white minority controlled the cities
during this time period and they referred black, coloured and Indian people to
live in isolated townships outside the cities. The result became the segregated
city.
The township of Galeshewe in Kimberley is located close to the city centre
in comparison with townships in other South African cities. The reason for this
is that Galeshewe originated as a settlement for the black people working in
the diamond mine, today known as the Big Hole, which is located just next to
the Central Business District (CBD).
The work with the development of the Big Hole precinct aims at bringing
Kimberley’s segregated areas together by providing links between the township
of Galeshewe, the CBD and southern prosperous residential areas and by
developing housing and commercial areas in the undeveloped zone that today
separates Galeshewe from the CBD and the southern prosperous suburbs to create
a more coherent city structure.
Information about the planning conditions concerning our work with the Big
Hole precinct was gathered through inventories, municipal reports and through
plans closely related to the Big Hole precinct that will influence the area.
Three analyse methods was used in the project to find the guiding principles
for the development of the Big Hole precinct; Analysis of suggested land uses,
Kevin Lynch analysis and SWOT- analysis. The results of these analyses are that
the development in the Big Hole precinct needs to have a varied land use in
order to bring the scattered surrounding districts together and especially to
accommodate space for CBD with both formal and informal trading to grow in this
direction. The result was further that the development needs to reduce the
barrier effect between Galeshewe, CBD and the southern suburbs that the
mine-dumps today creates and to preserve as much of the existing built up
structure in the area to maintain the character of the area.
The proposal for the Big Hole precinct is based on the analyses and focuses
on reducing the importance of the car as transportation mean by providing
amenities and facilities closer to the township and by linking the street
network in Galeshewe to the streets in the CBD and the southern suburbs to make
it easier to move between these areas. Developments are also proposed in order
to fill the former undeveloped zone that separated Galeshewe from CBD and the
southern suburbs making the city more coherent and CBD orientated.
Principles for development and a spatial plan are proposed and presented
for the Big Hole precinct which focuses on extending the CBD to the western and
southern part of the project area and towards the Open Mine Museum and
Galeshewe. The spatial plan and principles also focuses on making the area
available for the public and on bringing the scattered residential areas that
surrounds the Big Hole precinct together. The surrounding areas are foremost
brought together with links that stretches both in an east western direction
and in a north southern direction. How these links can be developed is also
proposed through a street network plan for the Big Hole precinct which shows
how different traffic modes can be prioritised on different street to make the
area more safe and secure.
The links are further developed and proposals for their developments are
made in detail as our separated parts in the report. Therese Byheden has worked
with the east-western links which connect residential areas in the west and CBD
and developed them through proposing activities along them that are related to
the existing land use, CBD and the Open Mine Museum. Maria Lejdebro has
moreover worked with the links in the north-southern direction connecting
Galeshewe and the souther...
