Apotheosis of the street

JAN WAREEUS
correspondent | Wednesday May 1, 2013 00:00

I'm being harsh, as I have seen so many interesting planning initiatives in countries not so Western-orientated. Maybe a change will come with the now necessary closer partnership with Eastern countries - let's hope so, as they often have more feasible alternatives to Western zoning, functionalism and overblown rationality - giving space for more traditions of importance.

When I decided to elaborate on the street and its proper development, I can hardly (for this region in Southern Africa) prescribe the same solutions as ethnocentric urbanists in the West are doing, as they are basing their main experience from old European cities. So, I turn my eyes elsewhere.

As we in this moment will have no success in turning our highways and modern communication lanes into something less one-dimensional and pure technological stints, we have (for some time) to concentrate on our pedestrian roads. If we can sort out how they should be designed to meet our 'genetic' needs (as per previous writings), we have gone a long way in designing our future technical needs, too - believe you me.

Consequently, I will here illustrate a newly designed (well, 1974) but old fashioned pedestrian road/mall with a layout from Iran. The name of the new town is Shushtar, located some 450 km southwest of Teheran (the capital) and not far from the border with Iraq. Unfortunately, it is a town filled with sugar refineries and thus vulnerable to annihilation if bad comes to worse. Refining sugar is obviously a suspect trade when being in Iran!      PICTURE 11. Persian Garden with Public Bath2. Dwellings and Shops3. Institute of Technology4. Primary School5. Pedestrian Bridge6. School7. Bazar8. Shops9. Green Space10. Commercial Centre11.  Shops12. Civic Centre13. Main Mosque14. Public Gardnes15. Commerce and Dwellings16. Public Gardens17. Open Space  

The layout of a part of the town is from the beginning of the '70s, as I've mentioned. The new part of the town was carefully designed with a pedestrian street/mall as a feature. The Iranian planners/urbanists knew what they were doing.

All buildings are reached by cars but not easily. People can walk to everything needed and of interest. Landmarks were built - markets, bazaars, mosques, schools, a city hall, library and more. And all this could be done in Gaborone as well. Checking Google Earth, the new part of the town has still not been finalised but what is built carefully follows the layout indicated in the plan. An unfortunate war with Iraq came in between when the West supported Iraq (and Saddam Hussein) and delayed the building of Shushtar.

Despite all I have written about the necessity to plan for the pedestrians in various articles over the years, not much of this approach has been used in Gaborone. One may wonder why? I hope I can explain this in a follow-up article.My second illustration is from the Ghanzi Development Plan. When working with ARUP Botswana on this plan (in 2001-03), and expansion areas had to be planned in detail, an interesting issue came up - the move of the Airfield to the outskirts of the town and, thus, an opening up of a huge central area for urban development. We had the eminent Chris Sharp (with a long experience from Ghanzi from 1970-74 as District Officer) and when brainstorming about what to do with the old Airstrip he said - that strip is actually the Main Street of Ghanzi! Made me start thinking!How could a dull straight and rather level area be used by future inhabitants? I had to go to my planning gurus - the Krier Brothers.

And I soon found out that we had to design a 'landmark' for Ghanzi. A 'Promenade' filled with local history and more modern symbols. The result was done in haste but here I'm repeating it below:

Illustration from the ARUP Development Plan for Ghanzi -pic 2A 'Promenade' was created along the old Airfield filled with historical symbols and new made artefacts. To my perplexed mind, no councillor even noted the effort - my presentation went almost unnoticed!

Anyhow, if you are interested in the proposal for the 'Promenade' in Ghanzi - a way for the planner to create a true landmark - the few sketches indicated above and explained in text from the proposal follows here:I quote from the development plan the following as regards the Ghanzi Promenade:Ideas for Attractions:

*Illustrations 1, 2 and 3 (on the picture) are indicating a possible way of making.... a Town Park, a Museum (with a Tourist Center), Community Town Hall and a Traditional Village. As part of the Museum, it is proposed that a 100m part of the existing runway is retained and turned into an open-air museum with vintage aircrafts collected and displayed. For example, a few of the old Pipers the old farmers used for their visits to Gaborone and other places could be exposed in the interest of many people as well as some outdated crafts from the Botswana Defence Force (BDF). The main attraction should be the old DC-3 going to Ghanzi once a week and, even better, an old Junker JU-52, both models used in the mid 1900. Botswana has so far not anything like this and why not creating a modest Air Museum in Ghanzi? Next to the Museum and the remains of the old Airfield, an interesting maze could be created to the pleasure of visitors and the inhabitants. Illustrated is a hedge maze but a stone one will serve as good, if not better, given the stony environment of Ghanzi. A Museum and a Traditional Village, too, are essential for this area. To this place, historical artefacts like Kgosi Sebele's 'prison' could be moved as well as the old DC's mansion (with servants quarters) not to talk of some many unique self-help structures that now are being destroyed due to poor appreciation of history. In this way, an important node of the Ghanzi Promenade is created.

*Illustration 4 at the pedestrian crossroads from the old centre and the Promenade is an interesting point of importance and should be handled with care. Our illustration is an indication of a 'fountain' or a 'waterhole'. Some of the many skilled sculptors in the district can contribute with 'cattle' around a hole, possible for children to climb, and suddenly, an interesting meeting place has been created.

*Illustrations 5, 6 and also 9 and 10 indicate that 'squares' with canopies of planted trees can be essential to the promenade, especially in combination with market places, so much needed for informal business.

*Illustration 7 indicates that man-made 'urban' canopies with design references to the old Greece as well as Arabic cultures can also be interesting in this context.

* Illustration 8 is simply pointing out that underpasses and a pedestrian fly-over will in the long run be needed, and should not serve the direct purpose, only. There are 'gates' between areas that need to be designed as portals/porticos leading from one area to another. This doesn't add much cost to the basic functional use. It is just to care for the environment in a creative way.As can be seen from the proposal, we hope to experience a greater feeling for time and place - the history of Ghanzi is of utmost importance and in need of proper handling.Ghanzi has a unique historical development and this is possible to form a basis for the future!

Question is: are we so obsessed with a new commercial lifestyle that we have forgotten our past? That's a hard question for the planners who have to deal with the renewal of our old City and other places - or are our architects and urban designers only 'showroom salesmen'?