21st Century (2000–present)

Harare Master Plan

2019 · Zimbabwe · Sub-Saharan Africa · National modernization and capital-city building · Planned by City of Harare
Central skyline of Harare, capital of Zimbabwe.
Central skyline of Harare, capital of Zimbabwe. · CC BY-SA 3.0

Core idea

Densification, sanitation, mobility

Why it matters

Capital’s attempt to reverse decline

Description

The Harare Master Plan of 2019, prepared by the city council, is an attempt to replace a long-outdated planning framework for Zimbabwe's capital. Its priorities are densification of a low-rise, sprawling city, restoration of failing water, sanitation and waste systems, and improved mobility between the centre and its townships and peri-urban settlements. It is a city-wide statutory plan produced amid severe fiscal and institutional constraint.

Significance

The plan is significant as a capital city's effort to reverse decades of infrastructural decline and unplanned expansion following economic crisis, within a planning system still shaped by inherited colonial legislation. It speaks to a wider African debate about whether master planning is the right instrument for cities where most growth is informal and municipal capacity is thin. Its fate is closely tied to Zimbabwe's political and economic trajectory.

What shaped it

Sources

Open it on the interactive timeline →
hub.toekom.st — History of Urbanism · an interactive timeline of 850 planned cities across 6,000 years.