Shack Urbanity – Process and the Civic Motif: Incremental upgrading and discovering ‘on-the-ground’ realities of implementation

Presentation at The ACC at UCT:

Thompson discusses what she calls Shack Urbanity[1] – the shantytown architecture that develops on the peripheries of most cities in the developing world and some cities in the developed world. In South Africa these developments continuously metabolise offering existing and arriving residents a place from which to conduct their daily lives within an affordable proximity to an opportunity for employment. Past and present demagogic governments have addressed the spinoff poor living conditions in these deceptively non-permanent shantytowns. A rehabilitated planning policy under ongoing scrutiny and a view to formalising the informal has introduced a spectrum of methodologies aimed at improving conditions in informal settlements.

Duncan Village (DV), in East London in the Eastern Cape, is one of the oldest settlements in South Africa with over 100 years of history dating back to 1890 when the municipality translated a racial divide into the geographic locations of the East and West Bank of the city.  The settlement was named after Sir Patrick Duncan in 1941 after he initiated a leased-tenure housing scheme as a response to overcrowding and appalling conditions. His memorial and final resting place can be found at Duncan Dock in the Cape Town harbour. The UN State of the Cities report 2010/2011 cited East London as having the highest inequality coefficient in the world.

A 3-site component of the Duncan Village Redevelopment Initiative UISP project has been clambering for the finish line for over a decade. Thompson’s involvement with this Case Study was as Project Architect for a period of 2 years[2] on an inherited site plan, which was the outcome of an international housing competition. In 2005 this mega-project, aiming to deliver 20,000 dwellings, was identified as 1 of 2 such pilots in the Eastern Cape.  The history of stalled attempts at improvements to DV was repeated after a myriad of hurdles including two 12-month construction halts, extreme vandalism to part completed homes, contractual issues, and only 7 beneficiaries occupying their homes after the initial contract was paused. The project is now moving quickly since its 3^rd restart in November 2012 and is looking to completion in 2014 – more than 10 years after its inception and 20 years after democracy.

This presentation discusses the research aims of understanding what nuanced and ‘on-the-ground’ scenarios are faced when all the boxes of best practice theories and policy have been ticked and embraced. Why does a project, high on the political agenda and with all the alleged ingredients for success and positive results, struggle to deliver to the citizens to whom it promises a chance of a better livelihood? What are the effects of these upgrading project processes on the social ‘world’ of the beneficiaries? And what can be understood from the process of the shift to ‘formality’ by beneficiaries? These research questions ultimately aim to gain understanding the effects of the upgrading process on the civic motif.