Gaborone Development Plan
Core idea
Low-density city to nodes
Why it matters
Manages growth in a small capital
Description
The Gaborone Development Plan of 2009, prepared under the Government of Botswana's town and country planning system, guides growth in one of Africa's most orderly post-independence capitals. Responding to the sprawling, low-density form inherited from Gaborone's garden-city-influenced origins, the plan promotes a structure of nodes and activity centres, densification of selected areas, and coordinated land allocation and infrastructure for a fast-growing but still modestly sized capital.
Significance
The plan is significant as a case of steady, state-led planning in a stable African country, managing the transition of a planned post-colonial new town into a maturing capital city. It reflects the wider Southern African challenge of retrofitting polycentric structure and density onto low-rise, land-consumptive urban forms, and Gaborone is often cited in comparative studies of planned capitals in the Global South.
What shaped it
- The master plan (early 20th c.)
- World becomes majority urban (2007)
- Transit-oriented development (TOD) (1993)
- Global financial crisis (2007–2009)
- Zoning (1884 Germany / 1916 NYC)
Sources
- https://www.academia.edu/24507095/Ministry_of_Lands_and_Housing_Department_of_Town_and_Regional_
- https://www.research-collection.ethz.ch/bitstream/handle/20.500.11850/87746/eth-26727-01.pdf