Planning Forum Volume 18

Deciphering the Drivers of Informal Urbanization by Ghana’s Urban Poor Through the Lens of the Push-Pull Theory

Gideon Abagna Azunre | Richard Azerigyik | Pearl Puwurayire

Abstract:

For years informal urbanization by the urban poor and its spatial outcomes—i.e., slums—have become ubiquitous in Global South cities, particularly Africa. Consequently, authorities are engineering strategies that could arrest and slow down its proliferation in the quest for resilient and sustainable cities. Within the complex discourse of informal urbanization, one very crucial piece of evidence that appears to be unclear pertains to its driving factors. Using Ghana—particularly rapidly urbanizing southern Ghanaian cities—as an empirical case, this paper untangles the complex and multidimensional drivers of slum growth beyond the traditional population-heavy approaches. Using the push-pull theory as a conceptual and analytical prism, analyses reveal that poorly designed housing policies, the informal economy, weak urban planning, political interferences and political clientelism accelerates slum growth. The article argues that coping with unplanned urbanization by the urban poor may be extremely tenuous if these complex factors are not well-understood and seriously considered in policy circles. The findings of the article also lend credence to arguments that call for a shift from population-heavy readings of urban challenges in Africa to more institutional, political, and historical perspectives. The paper concludes by recommending that states and city authorities ought to recognize and address their institutional culpabilities in contributing to slum growth. A critical starting point could be the re-examination of draconian policies and the adoption of inclusive, pro-poor, and proactive urban strategies.

Keywords:

Informal urbanization; Slums; Push-Pull theory; Sustainable City Development; Ghana

‘Planning Ambassadors’ as Insurgent Spatial Actors: Women and the Re-Territorialization of the Public Escalators in Medellín, Colombia

Evan Todtz

Abstract

Situated in the western hillsides of Medellín, the central stairway in Las Independencias (I) historically served as the primary neighborhood circulation route, but also acted as an invisible border delimiting conflicting spatial claims by disparate armed factions vying for territorial control. Decades of intense urban violence culminated in the early 2000s with a series of state-sponsored military interventions that left the community reeling. The emergent model of social urbanism in the mid-2000s sought to redress historic inequities in the city’s peripheries. Under this directive, the state executed a physical intervention in the community to de-territorialize the underlying geographies of violence by replacing the central stairway with a new public escalator system. While projects executed under social urbanism frequently attribute success to the project’s design merit and broad social impact, this mixed-methods design study completed along the public escalators shows that the primary driver of individual and neighborhood advancement in Las Independencias (I) has been the re-territorialization of these spaces through insurgent spatial practices by residents rather than the state’s physical intervention. Intimate insights into daily life along the public escalators reveal how women, in particular, emerge as critical actors in the re-territorialization of the escalators, despite persistent gender imbalances in public space and shifting geographies of violence encroaching into the domestic realm. Focusing on people rather than the state underscores how centering the narratives and perspectives of women allows these community ambassadors to plan for, create, and steward emancipatory spaces where individual and community autonomy reside. 

Keywords

Re-territorialization; Women in Planning; Insurgent Planning; Social Urbanism; Invisible Borders; Public Space Appropriation 

Performance Evaluation of A Public Transportation System: Analyzing the Case of Dhaka, Bangladesh

Rakibul Ahasan | Ahsanul Kabir 

Abstract

Performance evaluation of public transportation systems is an important prerequisite to making a rapidly growing city livable. Despite the presence of public transportation since the 1960s, few studies talk about the efficiency of transportation systems in cities. The objective of this research is to assess the performance of an existing system. Based on a set of performance measurements identified from the literature, we captured five categories: passengers’ and operators’ perspectives – service efficiency, system efficiency, cost efficiency, utilization efficiency, and network efficiency to evaluate public transit efficiency. The results indicated that the existing service quality in Dhaka is less satisfactory compared to other cities with system, network, and cost efficiency being below average. But utilization efficiency is better, which could result from the overuse of vehicles and workers being involved in operating them. Also, the most concerning issue with the existing transportation system is congestion. In terms of the strengths and weaknesses, we find that the implementation of metro rails, bus route restructuring, and a separate policy for the city’s public transportation system cast some hope in addressing some immediate problems in the rapidly growing city of Dhaka. 

Keywords

Public Transportation; Performance Evaluation; System Efficiency; Service Efficiency; Quality of Service; Dhaka; Bangladesh

Starring The Treasures and Trauma in Home-Based Enterprises: Towards A Rethink by Urban Planners

Nkeiru Ezeadichie | Joy U. Ogbazi 

Abstract

Rapid urbanization in the Global South, and its accompanying challenges have heightened in African cities. One consequence of Africa’s urbanization that cuts across most of its nations is the high rate of urban unemployment which has led many urban poor residents to resort to seeking solace in informal employment opportunities. Africa’s most populous nation, Nigeria, has an escalated case of unemployment leading to the proliferation of informal economic activities in its cities, which are also predominantly home-based. The operation of informal economic activities in residential buildings is known as home-based enterprises (HBEs), which are attributed to low start-up capital, work-life balance and land use changes. This study focuses on the objective and empirical investigation of the effects of HBEs in cities of global South, using Enugu, a colonial, medium-sized administrative city in Nigeria as case study. The study projects the reasons why urban planners should acknowledge and maximize the potentials of this urbanization-driven phenomenon to meet some SDGs, while also controlling the negative impacts such as land use alterations to ensure sustainable cities. The objectives of the study are; i). To examine the dynamics of HBEs ii). to identify the Treasure in HBEs iii). to determine the Trauma of HBEs. iv). to recommend effective measures for managing HBEs for Sustainable development. It concludes by advocating that urban planners should consider the integration of HBEs into neighborhood schemes to maximize the potentials and effectively control the negative impacts thereby ensuring sustainable global South cities. 

Keywords

Treasure; Trauma; Informal; Home-Based Enterprises; Land use