re - Connection: finding place in a Bulawayo train station
Date
2012-08-30
Authors
Ckikerema, Gillian
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Abstract
Every city experience is defi ned by the connective qualities of individual places within the city, however these human bodily experiences can
potentially be disjointed if the individual places within the city are far from each other. Zimbabwe’s Bulawayo train station has become a lost place,
a phrase associated with abandoned and under-used urban spaces, mainly because of their lack of connectivity to the city (Trancik (1986). As part
of the government’s plan to improve Bulawayo’s public transport system, commuter rail transport is being introduced and expanded for public
convenience. Creating a new transport hub at the train station is not enough to make sure that people will use rail transport as a form of public
transport because the site’s location is outside the city. Th ough the place cannot be relocated nearer to the city, this thesis explores the ways in which
this lost place can be reconnected to the city and transformed into a revitalised and vibrant transport hub for commuters from within and outside
Bulawayo.
One of the main aspects of ‘fi nding’ lost places involves using urban commuter rituals to rejuvenate the train station. Th ese rituals will be used to
activate the internal and external spaces of the train station as a method of connecting the site to the city. Since movement is a vital entity of places
of transit, restoring all commuter, private and public vehicular links from the city to the station will become another method of re-connection to
be explored. Reconnecting existing comatose transit systems rejuvenates and improves the effi ciency of the urban life, however, more people in
Zimbabwe are not using mass transport modes because of lack of security and their inaccessibility to the city centre. Public transport nodes are
eroding fast and people are resorting to hitchhiking on a daily basis. Th is quality of life is taking over the city whilst abandoning other existing
public transport systems. New routes of circulation are going to be established as a result of the new train station. Areas of commercial and social
activity will occur bringing on the need for the area around the train station to be rezoned so as to accommodate the expected development. Th e
station’s new programme will help realise the potential of places of transit as social centres that people can go to and not as temporal nodes of
transit that people merely go through. Th e building’s new programme will allow spaces to create a new sense of place shaped by the users and their
ritualistic activities. Whether they are formal or informal, these activities mark the new identity of the city’s commuter experience and at the same
time act as a gateway to the many opportunities that lie in the city.