Freedom and the shape and form of South African cities

Freedom is so complicated. There are so many difficult decisions to make all the time. Do I get Top TV with its new porn channels? Do I marry a gay person? Do I wear a headscarf to work? Do I circumcise myself after high school? Do I circumcise my son at birth? Do I just let my foreskin do its own thing?

It was all so much easier in the old days when they treated us like children. We were told what to think, told what to do, told where to stay, who to have sex with and what gods to pray to.  Now of course, there is so much choice that it is mind boggling and we all suddenly expected to be adults and make up our own minds.

It does seem though that the ideas that we have of freedom take longer to trickle down to some aspects of our lives than it does to others. The aspect that I am quite interested in of course the urban aspect. Cities and town in South Africa now accommodate half the country’s population. That means that 50% of the country’s population now look to towns and cities for the space they need to express their freedom.

So, I ask:

“How has freedom changed the shape and form of our cities since the days of apartheid?”

When I drive the dusty streets of Missionvale or Motherwell, I am struck by how little has visibly changed since freedom. There are still shacks, far and remote from the city. Refuse clutters up open spaces and things seem generally run down. My mother-in-law lives in a cul-de-sac in Connacher Street, New Brighton. (Yes I have the freedom to choose a mother in law from New Brighton) I have been visiting her there since the late eighties and have, since those days, every winter, had to park my car in the same muddy puddle outside her house. Freedom has not yet tarred the dirt road outside my mother in law’s house. Freedom has, though, managed to build a Stadium, a Casino, two five star hotels, a number of glitzy shopping malls, a billion dollar container port and a very big brewery.  Sure, the townships have rows and rows of new concrete block, featureless RDP houses. Some street lights and sewers have been installed, but no matter what way you look at it, we are still faced with a stark and distinct contrast between town and township. There is no blurring of the edges in any way. Yes, millions have been spent on infrastructure. Yes, the scale of the problem is immense, but we would not be doing justice to the challenge by not being brutally honest that we are nowhere near achieving the objective of making “township”, “town”. If we continue to move at this pace, I can assure you, our cities in 20 years’ time, will still be characterised by the terms “town” and “township”.

Many of my friends, I am sure, will say that I am confusing “freedom” with “prosperity” and that we are all now free to pull ourselves up by our bootstraps. We are all now free to get a fancy job and buy a house in Summerstrand, away from the muddy township streets, littered parks and shack land gangsters. But these friends may be overlooking an important piece of context here. We must remember that the shape and form of our cities is set in the mould of a grand apartheid plan. A spatial plan that not only kept people of different complexions apart, but much, much more significantly, housed  the poor and working class in locations remote from the city centre, remote from opportunity and remote from cultural institutions. It kept the poor remote from all the benefits that come from the proximity generally associated with living in a city. But most curiously and surprisingly, in Nelson Mandela Bay, we have continued to build our city in this mould. We have continued in almost all instances to perpetuate the apartheid city masterplan; locating poor and working people further and further from the centre beyond Motherwell on the road to Addo and beyond Bethelsdorp on the back road to Kwanobuhle.

No matter what we say, poor people are not free to live where they want in the city. Poor people are not free to take advantage of the opportunities that the city has to offer. Poor people continue to be located in such a way and under such conditions as to be lumped with all the disadvantages of rural living, without any of its advantages. They are located in such a way as to be exposed to all the disadvantages of urban living, without any of its advantages. Ask these people to list what has changed in their lives since freedom, and I expect you will not need a very long page.

My argument ,  therefore,  is  that, quite a few (not all) of the causes of poverty and barriers to progress in our city have to do with physical and spatial planning features we have inherited. My further argument is that we have done very little so far to undo this terrible planning legacy, we are instead, perpetuating it.

We can definitely do better, but in order to do so we have to agree that this matter belongs on the agenda and deserves urgent attention. “Business as usual” Is just not an option.

THC

Searching for the real thing

This piece first appeared in The Herald on 10 April 2013.

It was a particularly miserable Wednesday evening on Stanley Street. The Easter Weekend rain that had washed away the Splash festival had left behind a cold, damp windy drizzle in its wake. But still, the street pavements were full of people; students, yuppies, car guards, artists, hippies, wanabee’s and buskers. It was a week night. It was a wet night. It was a cold night, but still we struggled to get an inside table at a restaurant or find a parking spot.

So, as we sipped our wine outside, on the pavement, huddled in our jackets against the wind, I could not help but wonder a little about why Stanley Street, in Richmond Hill, has become such a popular place to be. I mean, it’s nice, there are people walking up and down, quaint shops and restaurants, trees planted down each side of the street, but no evidence of any flamboyant spending. No dancing fountains, no Zara super store, no four storey high ice-rinked  atrium with glass lifts whizzing silently up and down. Why then, were my wife and I, like so many others, rather, instead, not enjoying climate controlled, 24 hour security, undercover parking,  porcelain tiled comfort of any number of malls, shopping centres or franchise eateries available for us to choose from on any given evening. Why were we abandoning comfort and security for this wobbly table on a windy sidewalk in an ageing part of town.  I am sure some would argue that Stanley Street’s popularity has to with the quality of its restaurants. Some would talk about accessibility; others still would guess that about the particular entrepreneurial vision of a key initial property investor.

But I don’t think the success and popularity can necessarily be ascribed to any one of those factors in isolation. In fact, I am trying here to convince you, that what we see in Stanley Street is evidence of a far greater global movement and mind shift. And, of course, it’s not just Stanley Street. We see this re-awakening in Central, we have seen it in the Cape Town inner-city. All through the UK, US and Australia inner-city neighborhoods have become re-invigorated filled with new life, new energy and new business. So, what’s this all about? I am arguing that this phenomenon,  is evidence of the beginning of a wider shift in consciousness which includes the wholesale rejection of all that is fake, a rejection falsehood, pretense and scam.  As mass manufacture, mass media and massive institutions private and public seek do dominate and control, we see beginnings of a backlash and a resistance.

Being continually bombarded by commercial messages and plots to extract money from us has left many cynical and jaded. Growing numbers of people no longer trust big business, big money and big institutions. These powerful “machines” make us stand in queues, they make us talk to their call centres, they keep making us change our passwords, they anger and frustrate us. This new cynicism has led to rush for antiques and collectables instead of cheap Chinese imports  and a rush to social media instead of American TV channels.  Those that still watch TV, watch “reality” TV choosing rather to watch the boring authentic lives of Big Brother housemates over the fake interesting lives of The A Team, Knightrider or the Brady Bunch. More and more people reject branded goods for the hand made alternative. Artisan breads, micro-breweries and a Barista crafting your Cappuccino just the way you like it.

Grassfed beef, whole milk, free range chicken and genuine leather are all part of this movement toward authenticity. Less and less do we tolerate artificial flavouring, dubbed movies or plastic Christmas trees. They are just not the real thing and are not good enough.

A growing number of people are searching for authenticity. People are searching for what is real, sincere and meaningful. For our cities, that means more and more people will come to reject remote suburban malls. More and more people will reject the franchise steakhouse with is standardised happy birthday clap along song and dance. The taste for the authentic drives these people away from the remote, sterile, cookie cutter secure complexes in Lorraine. This movement drives people away from insanely clean, manicured office parks where people live out their days in insanely sterile manicured office jobs. 

In growing numbers, people choose Stanley Street and other inner city environs like it, not because they are cleaner, not because it is dryer or less windy, not because the pick pockets and drug dealers are banished, but because these environments feel real, they feel sincere and they feel authentic. These environments exhibit less evidence of heavy handed government planning controls that seek to sterilise and segregate. Houses in a houses zone. Shops in a shops zone and restaurants in a restaurant zone. Buildings neatly spaced out with nice lawn between them. No messy parking in the street. No people cluttering up the pavement. All very clean, but oh so boring and oh so fake.

Perhaps, what we see starting in Stanley Street and in Central can be the beginning of that “special something”  that Port Elizabeth and the Nelson Mandela Bay has to offer the world. PE can’t be more Joburg than Joburg. PE can’t be more Hollywood than Hollywood. PE can’t be more Vegas than Vegas, but PE can be the best in the world at being sincerely, authentically PE, the real thing!

Tim Hewitt-Coleman

March 2013 Newsletter for the Easter Cape Institute of Architects

Dear Colleagues,

March 2013 newsletter

I was watching with interest how the Easter Weekend rain washed away the "Splash Festival" (again). This muddy no-show came after weeks of consternation about the budget and wringing of hands about the "Splash" brand and how to best position the Nelson Mandela Bay "brand" in the eyes of tourists and locals. But, if one can look through the hype and sales talk of events Companies and PR types, there is of course the real and on-going dilemma of how cities and regions compete for the attentions of the fickle masses of tourists and business people.

The message of how great/clean/fun/crime free/inexpensive your particular town or city is, is very difficult to get across and be heard above the noise of paid commercial advertising from Reebok, Coke or Castle Lager.

By comparison, actually, Architects have a much stronger "brand" than most, cities regions and even many countries. (I would guess that more people in the world know what an Architect is, compared to the amount of people who know where Cape Town is)

The word "Architect" (and its translation into every spoken language) has a real and specific meaning all over the world. If you say you are an Architect, there is a degree of trust that you know something about buildings and about their design. This has been the case for hundreds of years. We are custodians of a very strong brand that is likely to stay strong for hundreds more years if we look after it. But what can you and I do? I am sure we can think of a hundred ways to defend and strengthen our brand ( and I for one, would like to here from readers of this mail regarding those ideas).

But, if we think about Coca-Cola for a second. Such a simple product, but one which keeps a promise, one which maintains the trust of the consumer. When you open a can of Coke (no matter where you bought it, no matter how much you paid) you know that you are going to taste Coke. Not milk, not horse urine, not watered down Coke without fizz, but Coke. The real thing. We all trust the Coke brand and that's why we buy it. The Coca-Cola company does not let any other drink call themselves Coke. It does not even allow them to come close to using their colors or their particular font or shape.

Architects; i suggest that this is the attitude that we must have toward our brand. If an Architect claims to be selling the services of an Architect, that is what she must deliver. Not milk, not horse urine, no watered down Coke with no fizz. To allow inferior service, not worthy of the brand "Architect", will diminish and eventually destroy this fantastic gift that we have been given. Who must police this service? I argue to you today, that it is us as Architects that must do this work, as fearless volunteers, not government, no not SACAP or other regulated bodies. We must do it.

With our brand intact we will survive the fashions of procurement and tendering that will come and go as the economy and the public mood breathes in and out.

So what can we do? ........Many, many things. Let’s begin by sharing with each other the good ideas that we have for strengthening our brand. As some clever Chinese chap, (whose name I have just forgotten and whom I am probably misquoting)  is once rumoured to perhaps have said.

"Everyone action taken is worth a thousand good intentions"

Yours in pursuit of Architectural Excellence,

Tim Hewitt-Coleman - Architect.