School of Architecture and Planning (ETDs)
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Item Alternative Tenure Options as a Stepping Stone for Urban Land Reform: The Case of Kwa Mai Mai Muthi Market(University of the Witwatersrand, Johannesburg, 2024-02) Mnguni, Thobeka; Maina, Miriam M.This research uses qualitative methods to investigate the case of the Kwa Mai Mai muthi market located in the central business district of Johannesburg where over the decades informal traders have converted their trading units into residential homes. This case is used to respond to the research question, ‘To what extent is taking administrative action to improve land tenure by offering communities rights to occupy urban land feasible and necessary for advancing the urban land reform agenda?.’ The research acknowledges that popular approaches to improving tenure by converting insecure tenure rights to statutory ownership through the Deeds office has had limited success and resulted in efficiencies due to the high costs and the resources intensive nature of this approach. Instead, the research recommends a necessary transition to improving tenure in innovative, context-specific ways that work to build on existing settlements through taking low-cost and low LOE administrative action.Item Heirloom between the tracks— Revealing hybrid landscapes of rest and reflection at Langlaagte Cemetery(University of the Witwatersrand, Johannesburg, 2024-02) Skudder, Emma Catherine; Hart, BrendanSituated in a sea of grass alongside the Johannesburg railway lines, lie rows of graves lost in an overgrown landscape. Some marked, some unmarked, all invisible to the passer-by. This landscape is rooted between multi-cultural communities with a heritage dating back to the origins of Johannesburg. Paarlshoop, Langlaagte-North, Mayfair-West and Brixton border its edges, which establishes the core of this research— the site. To understand the intricacies of the site, is to understand the project intent. Where there are graves, there is abandoned heritage, lost memory and forgotten stories. Where there are railway buildings, there is existing community claim to be enriched. Where there are grasses, shrubbery, and treelines there is connection to agricultural pasts. Heirloom between the tracks, bridges the urban lifeways of the site with a heritage-focussed centre weaving together old and new, facilitating the surrounding community and providing a space for memory. With a contextual, history-driven, and postcolonial lens, the beacon of this thesis was using methods of remembrance, acknowledging the site’s unavoidable histories, tying back into the surrounding community through revealing, engaging, and re-inscribing. Spaces of commemoration and recreational landscapes, stitch new narratives onto the site for a multifunctional, small-scale heritage hub. This hub ties together archiving, storytelling and making spaces, with spaces of skills-development and contextually functional service provision. By establishing this site-centred facility, micro-industry, heritage, and identity are re-rooted and fed back into its surrounds, nurturing the existing conditions upon which they reside, establishing an architectural tapestry, a quilt, an heirloom.Item Waste Not, Plant, Rot: A wastewater treatment centre that produces sustainable resources in Norwood, Johannesburg(University of the Witwatersrand, Johannesburg, 2024-02) Glanville, Robyn Alice; Stone-Johnson, BrigittaThis research investigates the delivery of essential resources - water, energy, and food around Orange Grove and Norwood, Johannesburg, where all three aspects are threatened by pollution and inaccessibility. Drawing upon permaculture and biomimicry principles, the study explores localized resource management in neighbourhood nodes to address the pressing issue of sustained inequality in South Africa. Focusing on a wastewater treatment plant and an aquaponic farm in Orange Grove, Johannesburg, the project aims to generate sustainable materials, produce, clean water, and energy while fostering spatial and social justice opportunities through community engagement and learning.Item Sound Incubator: South African Music Library; Improv and Live Performance at the gateway to Alexandra, Johannesburg(University of the Witwatersrand, Johannesburg, 2024-02) Gimpel, Ariella; Hart, BrendanSound is not just an abstract concept; it is an instrument of expression in South Africa. It serves as a means to praise or protest, to unite or disperse, to energize or to mourn. Sound is not confined to a vacuum; rather, it exists within the realm of physical space and unfolds over time. In this regard, sound and architecture share an intrinsic connection as they both occupy and shape the spaces they inhabit. This thesis embarks on a journey to unravel the intricate interplay between sound and architecture within the dynamic context of Johannesburg, South Africa. The focal point of this exploration is the ‘Sound Incubator,’ a speculative architectural intervention designed to facilitate live performances. Its purpose is to foster artistic talent by deliberately intersecting diverse artists, thereby igniting creativity and safeguarding cultural heritage. My investigation commences with South African music and live performance, recognizing their immense cultural, social, and economic potential while acknowledging the scarcity of suitable venues for these experiences. I then delve into the essential architectural considerations, encompassing acoustics, psycho-acoustics, psychogeography, the symbiotic relationship between music and architecture, and the role of improvisation as a means of creation and learning. Amidst the intricate tapestry of Alexandra township in Johannesburg, a community shaped by ongoing political struggles and rapid urbanisation, we find a resourceful, rhythmical, and diverse population deeply committed to the arts. The current and historic soundscape of Alexandra, which exists in an improvised state of survival – provides the ideal context for the Sound Incubator.