Gaborone after Independence
Wednesday, September 21, 2016
Nor has it been asked if subsequent developments served to validate the 1963 plan or perhaps to demonstrate how erroneous had been the assumptions on which it had been based. At first sight, the government’s decision to buy Broadhurst A farm and then in 1971 to commission a new Gaborone plan suggested that many of the original assumptions about the new town had indeed proved to be wrong. A mere eight year gap between one plan and another might confirm this point of view.
Clearly the new Gaborone grew much quicker than had been anticipated with the government itself recognising very early the need to acquire Broadhurst A. The new plan was essentially residential, principally to embrace the newly obtained farm area. But it is still not clear to me what triggered this new growth bearing in mind that this was neither industrially nor commercially related.
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