The Cape Town World Cup Stadium glimmered in the afternoon sunshine, and the breeze from the ocean whipped the nearby neighborhood. Indeed, it was another perfect day in South Africa’s second-most populous city – yet there was almost no one to be seen. And there was no one on the new MyCiTi bus rapid transit (BRT) network at the stadium station, either. While this may seem like not a big deal, transportation infrastructure says a lot about the health of a city. So on second thought, it wasn’t another perfect day. In fact, it was far from it.
Cape Town is a sprawled city, largely due to Apartheid policies that separated racial groups by highways and railroads, so as to ironically immobilize through infrastructure that’s meant to bring mobility. Townships, where the majority of “black African” city residents live, are actually the densest areas of the city and are the farthest from the jobs and opportunities of the central business district (CBD). The stadium is near the CBD and “white African” areas, and far from shacks, so that FIFA viewers did not have to see shacks on the TV, and so that stadium-goers did not have to deal with fears of violence. But now the stadium has no permanent tenant (it is on public land), and it’s far from the people who need it most. The government wanted it built in townships, but FIFA protested. Now, the government is paying a lot to maintain this largely unused structure.
Train Station and ‘Un-Infilled’ Surrounding Township Land
(Un)luckily enough, a BRT network was built alongside the stadium, modeled after the first BRT system in the world in Curitiba, Brazil. If you are unfamiliar with BRT, it’s not just a fast bus. They are popular systems amongst developing countries, where most people don’t own cars, and where buses are not stigmatized as they are in the U.S. (which would rather implement more expensive and less adaptable light rail systems). But BRT is similar to light rail: it is supposed to have designated lanes, and pre-board payment systems so that time is not wasted boarding the bus. The problem in Cape Town, however, is that time is not what is being wasted: instead – you guessed it – it’s desperately needed money.
Curitiba (pronounced Curichiba) is a dense city, and their network was cheap and efficient. Cape Town’s system is clean, comfortable, reliable, and safe. But it is not necessarily needed in its present form. Two or three people board at most stops, and the major trunk route goes through an industrial area with few people walking around in the first place. While the city hopes to expand the network into townships and replace existing “normal” subsidized and contracted Golden Arrow buses with this new system, it hasn’t yet. This is because of violently opposed minibus associations in the townships. The route that has been completed goes through a relatively affluent area, where there were few minibus associations and few Golden Arrow buses, both of which were bought out along the completed route.
Isolated BRT Trunk Route
Most Capetonians take the delayed, overcrowded, and crime-ridden trains, or they take informal, black-owned, competitive and privatized minibuses. For a sprawled city, minibuses work well – they drop you off all over the city, and they pick you up all over as well. But they have been historically unsafe due to a lack of oversight and a lack of regulation, as well as a need to compete and drive fast to pick up the next passenger. They also can be inefficient because they will wait at taxi depots until they are full before leaving, keeping some waiting for even an hour. Still, the government has subsidized new and safe vans (minibuses) for some drivers, and people would rather have the comfort of the minibus over the trains, if they can afford it. The trains also may not stop nearby (the city is so sprawled), but the flexible and adaptable minibuses are literally everywhere.
If MyCiTi were to succeed in townships (mainly in the ‘Cape Flats’ neighborhoods), then it would be if it buys out the minibus owners and provides them with opportunities with MyCiTi. This is controversial because the minibuses are one of the few black-owned enterprise operations in the city. Nonetheless, at least they aren’t building a light rail instead of a BRT, like many American cities do. Light rail is more expensive because it requires track, and it only pays off if there is enough demand for it (which is true sometimes), seeing as more people can ride a single, rail-guided trainset than a bus. Also, most American cities that are old enough to not be entirely car-oriented and car-designed have rapid transit systems with their own complex histories already.
Minibus Hub in Downtown Cape Town
But even still, BRT is meant for dense cities, and Cape Town will need to continue to work on infill and transit-oriented development so as to connect these new BRT trunk and feeder routes in an accessible and efficient manner. The empty land along railroads and highways, which was once used to separate groups, could be transformed via public-private partnerships (which theoretically combine the efficiency of the private sector with subsidies and government regulations that mandate a certain level of service) into hubs of dense transit-oriented civic, residential, and economic space. Mixed-use developments could be built with the proper incentives, and social capital, jobs, opportunities, affordable housing, public space, and so much more could be accessible not only through these environmentally-friendly hubs but AT these hubs themselves. Feeder routes could empty here and the BRT trunk routes along highways (and the trains along the railroads) could pick up the passengers, if they don’t want to stay at the “local downtown” area. Maybe the remaining minibus drivers would also drive people here, and these areas would become the new taxi depots. Formal and informal uses would develop, perhaps with green roofs and vertical farms.
Highway Separates Wooden Shacks (See Fences)
Most importantly, these hubs will end up bridging the gap between the communities on the opposite sides of the track (literally and symbolically), in the same space that was once used to keep people away from each other. Mobility would be returned and the legacies of Apartheid — the social, economic, emotional, political, and physical wounds and holes in the city — would be alleviated and infilled. Instead of accepting the status quo of a sprawled Cape Town, and emphasizing minibuses as the permanent solution, the city can fight for it’s right to develop differently. And just maybe, in a future World Cup, FIFA would be fine with locating the stadium in the townships. People could get there easily, and they would also want to go there, because the hubs will become destinations in themselves.
The “Un-Infilled” Walk to the Train Station (Red Building in Background) in Langa Township
It’s possible, and if completed, Cape Town will have a sleek new system in order to help brand itself in a global economy. But it will continue to require a lot of money that could otherwise be used to simply fix up the profitable minibuses with GPS and card-based payments, among other fixes. It also would require the government to deal with corruption and actually follow through on its enforcement of the public-private partnerships, so that the project can increase revenue for the transportation agency while also providing services in historically neglected areas. It can combine the best of neoliberalism with the regulations of the public sector. The city is working on infill and transit-oriented development, but it takes a long time.
Back to the point: transportation methods which worked in Curitiba may not work in Cape Town. It’s not just Curitiba and Cape Town, either. Transportation cannot be ‘transported’; context is extremely important. Transportation infrastructure is planned in accordance with many powers, identities, and ideologies. Various man-made and natural social, economic, political, and environmental factors not only contribute to how infrastructure is designed, but also to how it can be positively enhanced. There is a reason behind every round-a-bout (or traffic light), and behind every diesel locomotive (or electric locomotive, hybrid locomotive, or EMU). This doesn’t mean that people should start from scratch everywhere. Ideas are obviously shared around the world. But they need to be translated; they can’t be simply transported. BRT could work in a future Cape Town, but it would not be the same system that a dense Brazilian city like Sao Paulo could build (which has the third highest density of buildings in the world).
Largest and Fastest Growing (Sprawling) Township in South Africa (Khayelitsha, Cape Town)
Informal Township in Johannesburg Periphery
In essence, smart transportation policy and planning can help to solve the core issues behind many urban problems through transit-oriented community development. But what is smart? What is community? What is transportation? What is a problem? For whom is it a problem? These are basic questions but they still get forgotten. I can tell you that the problems in the U.S. are not the same problems found in developing countries; in fact, some of those countries may even want to build the way the U.S. has built, even though the U.S. now faces problems itself.
Simultaneously decreasing sprawl and combatting suburban car congestion – while creating attractive and accessible post-industrial urban destinations – are the goals of many U.S. municipalities. Transportation hubs with substantial air rights as well as civic and retail space (which gives real estate revenue to the agency) are being (re)constructed to serve this goal.
Examples in New York include the new over-budget PATH hub for the Port Authority’s World Trade Center site and the new East Side Access terminal for the Long Island Rail Road in Grand Central Terminal, which is leased out by the MTA from a real estate firm as part of a history of the decline of Penn Central and its remaining landmarked real estate assets. Moreover, there have also been plans for the revitalization of Penn Station. Penn is owned by Amtrak ever since bankrupt Penn Central became part of a Conrail a few years after demolishing the old station and selling the real estate so as to build Penn Plaza (which is similar to the Pan Am/MetLife building above Grand Central). There’s also the new Fulton Center (st)hub in the heart of Lower Manhattan, which is a “stub of a hub” (as I call it) because it does not take advantage of its valuable prime real estate location by building towards the sky and including more commercial space. The MTA is also receiving funds from air rights for the Atlantic Yards and the Hudson Yards. Other examples include the Transbay Center in San Francisco, among so many others all across the world. Cape Town can look into hub development in the townships as well, as discussed earlier.
Historic La Luz Commuter Rail Station Hub in Sao Paulo; Center Platform Exit-Only
In Sao Paulo (which has the same number of people as the entire continent of Australia) another World Cup stadium rises. But unlike Cape Town, this stadium is being built in the periphery, next to favelas (which generally refer to slum settlements on un-bought public and private land). Even though this stadium will be owned by a popular club, the Corinthians, and even though it is being built in the periphery where impoverished people will benefit with increased jobs and opportunities, there are still problems. To repeat: this project is doing the opposite thing that Cape Town did, and there are still issues, including the removal of many favela residents. However, unlike Cape Town’s BRT connection, Sao Paulo does not have a BRT network. There are some designated lanes, but they don’t extend far, and there is no pre-board payment. It’s just never been done, even though there have been many proposals (think of the Second Avenue Subway in NYC). The government is corrupt and bureaucratic, the auto-industry has a lot of power in the city, and the road network was not planned well, if at all.
Sao Paulo World Cup Stadium (Metro Station in Foreground)
However, the city does have a Metro, commuter rail lines, and buses – all of which are the most crowded that I’ve ever seen. They’re definitely more crowded than New York’s, and even Beijing’s and Delhi’s. During rush hour, there can be a thirty minute wait just to pass through the turnstiles into the station, and then another three or so trains stop without being able to fit everyone on the platform. Eventually, you are pushed by the police onto the train.
In Sao Paulo, as in many Brazilian cities, the highway network has not been developed to the extent as it has been in the United States, so suburbanization has not really taken hold. Traffic is also extremely congested, so rich people prefer to live in the center of the city. The periphery is considered as a place for poor people in favelas, and rich residents prefer gated condominiums and helipads, so that they can be separated and secure. In Cape Town, rich (white) people also live relatively nearby the center of the city or in gated suburbs, because Apartheid-era townships were placed in the periphery. Race and class, of course, are intertwined with inequality in both of these cities. In more equal and homogeneous places (such as Hanoi), these are not concerns, so it is important to remember that context is paramount.
NORMAL Rush Hour in Sao Paulo Metro (Line to Enter Turnstile at La Luz Station)
Waiting for the Metro… and Waiting Again… and Again…
Corinthians-Itaquera is a major intermodal hub connecting the new World Cup stadium with the Metro, commuter rail, and public-private partnership feeder bus lines. The station also contains a mall and a multitude of government agencies and their offices. All of this real estate helps to provide revenue for the agency, similar to how the MTR in Hong Kong operates as one of the world’s few profitable public transportation authorities, and similar to the other hubs mentioned earlier in the article. Still, while this is a great transit-oriented development, it could be better with affordable homes for the favela residents.
Corinthians-Itaquera Hub (Government Agencies & Mall to the Left; Transit to the Right)
Every country, every city, every neighborhood, and every street need to be contextualized, because human beings are different. It’s really simple, but then again, it’s not, because otherwise we wouldn’t be dealing with so many planning issues. For instance, in general terms, biking is seen as a solution in Europe and North America, but in East Asia, it’s seen as a symbol of poverty and immobility. In Hanoi, Vietnam, people generally want more cars or motorcycles, even when there’s no space to park them and no subway (yet) to decrease congestion. The inter-city railway of Vietnam has been rebuilt since the U.S. bombings of the 1970s, but it does not really stop in the city itself. Highways and helicopter pads are being built, neither of which are accessible to most people (motorcycles cannot go on the highway). They are also building an elevated rapid transit network, which will not be done for a while. Moreover, the history of white flight, suburbanization, and the decline of railroads also does not apply to this city, among other social, economic, and political differences, which work together to create different situations on formal and informal networks. Some are capital cities, some are industrial cities, some are post-industrial, post-colonial, spiritual, old, new, ‘global’, ‘green’, or all of the above. The list goes on and on and your frames of reference need to be adjusted for every city.
Inter-City Railroad in Hanoi, Vietnam (& Rapidly Urbanized Villages)
Again, the point being that what works somewhere may not work a year later in that city, and probably won’t work at all somewhere else, depending on your qualitative and quantitative definitions of it working. There are going to be naysayers for every project, and if you think that their opinions do not have value, then you simply don’t know how to think in their shoes. Even the best idea will have problems, so it is important to take a middle-way and open-minded approach. It’s universally grey and that’s the paradox of transporting transportation.
Even still, be it Sao Paulo, Cape Town, Hanoi, or New York and New Orleans, the peripheries seem to universally have unequal transportation accessibility and mobility. Sao Paulo “favelas” deal with no Metro access and slow, bumpy, gang-affiliated public-private bus operators. Cape Town “townships” are the densest parts of the city and the farthest from the jobs. Hanoi “rural areas” deal with immense and chaotic traffic on the way into the city. New York and New Orleans “inner cities” like East New York and the Lower Ninth Ward also face unequal obstacles. At the same time, highways are sprouting up (namely in Sao Paulo and Hanoi), which do have some positive benefits, but American cities have seen what happens when they are too-heavily relied upon, and when public transit is ignored.
Bus Terminal in Favela (Northern Sao Paulo)
Mobility Difficulties in Northern Sao Paulo Favela (Among Other Difficulties…)
Motorcycles and Smog in Hanoi
Meanwhile… Helipads and Highways in Hanoi
This peripheral problem impacts the economy, environment, health, and culture of a city, among so many other factors. If it’s physically hard to get to your job or your school (or both) then it will be hard to be socioeconomically mobile, let alone physically mobile. Nearly everyone I talked to in Sao Paulo said that transportation was their main problem with the city, and that they spend hours on their commutes. In Cape Town, mobility is tied to race and to deep emotions regarding the legacies of Apartheid, as many non-Whites were not even legally allowed to enter the CBD decades ago without a work permit. In rapidly urbanizing and industrializing Hanoi, almost everyone seems to own a motorcycle, and smog is a constant problem.
From the differences in wild plant and animal species suitable to domestication to Western Europe’s proximity to the Atlantic Ocean, geography matters, location matters, space matters, and environments and climates matter. Geography creates social, economic, political, and physical regions. So even though cities may face similar peripheral problems in a general sense, under closer inspection, they are different problems. They are caused by different reasons. And, guess what? They require different solutions in order to bridge the gap.
Doha, Qatar Airport Montage (Culture & Context in Design) (Riel, 2013)
Amish Horse & Buggy Lanes in Pennsylvania (Riel, 2012)
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Rayn Riel is a student at Tufts University studying international urban development, his self-crafted major. Interested in transportation, he is the founder of Tufts’ only undergraduate urban development student organization and was an intern at the NYC Department of City Planning in Brooklyn in order to work on transportation accessibility and mobility in East New York. A writer on PlanYourCity, he has had planning work and research experience in the Americas, Asia, and Africa. This post is a result of his completion of a comparative urban planning study abroad program, which traveled to New Orleans, Sao Paulo, Cape Town, and Hanoi.
(All photos are taken by Rayn)
Additional photos…
New York City (Riel, 2014)
New Orleans (Riel, 2014)
Second Line in New Orleans (Riel, 2014)
Second Line in New Orleans (Riel, 2014)
Trolleys in New Orleans (Riel, 2014)
Receding Mississippi River (Riel, 2014)
Lower Ninth Ward, New Orleans (Riel, 2014)
Lower Ninth Ward, New Orleans (Riel, 2014)
Bus Lanes in Sao Paulo, Brazil (Riel, 2014)
Sao Paulo, Brazil (Riel, 2014)
Metro Crowds in Sao Paulo, Brazil (Riel, 2014)
Favela Fire in Sao Paulo, Brazil (Riel, 2014)
Yacht in Mall in Sao Paulo, Brazil (Riel, 2014)
Tagging in Sao Paulo, Brazil (Riel, 2014)
Sao Paulo, Brazil (Riel, 2014)
La Luz Station in Sao Paulo, Brazil (Riel, 2014)
Squatting in Sao Paulo, Brazil (Riel, 2014)
Sao Paulo, Brazil (Riel, 2014)
Taggers in Sao Paulo, Brazil (Riel, 2014)
Dense Favela in Sao Paulo, Brazil (Riel, 2014)
Public Health Concerns in Sao Paulo, Brazil (Riel, 2014)
Football Stadium Fan Barricades in Sao Paulo, Brazil (Riel, 2014)
Car-Free Avenue in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil (Riel, 2014)
Protest in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil (Riel, 2014)
Transportation Hub in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil (Riel, 2014)
Bo Kaap in Cape Town, South Africa (Riel, 2014)
Cape Town, South Africa (Riel, 2014)
Terminal in Cape Town, South Africa (Riel, 2014)
Walking to Train Station in Cape Town, South Africa (Riel, 2014)
Gated Mall in Cape Town, South Africa (Riel, 2014)
Gated Community in Cape Town, South Africa (Riel, 2014)
Gated Community in Cape Town, South Africa (Riel, 2014)
Public Housing in Cape Town, South Africa (Riel, 2014)
Penguins in Cape Town, South Africa (Riel, 2014)
Cape Town, South Africa (Riel, 2014)
Aquaponics in Gated Shopping Center in Cape Town, South Africa (Riel, 2014)
Cape Town, South Africa (Riel, 2014)
Broken, Inaccessible, Unsafe Bathrooms in Township in Cape Town, South Africa (Riel, 2014)
Butchering Pigs in Cape Town, South Africa (Riel, 2014)
Public Housing in Cape Town, South Africa (Riel, 2014)
Public Housing in Cape Town, South Africa (Riel, 2014)
Eid Celebrations in Bo Kaap, Cape Town, South Africa (Riel, 2014)
Cape Town, South Africa (Riel, 2014)
Traffic in Cape Town, South Africa (Riel, 2014)
New Developments in Cape Town, South Africa (Riel, 2014)
Slum in Hanoi, Vietnam (Riel, 2014)
Night Market in Hanoi, Vietnam (Riel, 2014)
Chinese Influence in Hanoi, Vietnam (Riel, 2014)
French Influence in Hanoi, Vietnam (Riel, 2014)
Railroad Bridge in Hanoi, Vietnam (Riel, 2014)
Hanoi, Vietnam (Riel, 2014)
The Ho Chi Minh Mausoleum in Hanoi, Vietnam (Riel, 2014)
Red Signal on Railroad in Hanoi, Vietnam (Riel, 2014)
Terminal in Hanoi, Vietnam (Riel, 2014)
Placeless Mega Mall in Hanoi, Vietnam (Riel, 2014)
Smog in Hanoi, Vietnam (Riel, 2014)
Fishing Village in Ha Long Bay, Vietnam
Light Rail Construction at Busy Intersection in Hanoi, Vietnam (Riel, 2014)
Highways, Motorcycles, and Development in Hanoi, Vietnam (Riel, 2014)
Hanoi, Vietnam (Riel, 2014)
Hanoi, Vietnam (Riel, 2014)
Hanoi, Vietnam (Riel, 2014)
Light Rail Construction in Hanoi, Vietnam (Riel, 2014)
Shopping at World’s Top-Rated Airport: Incheon International Airport, South Korea (Riel, 2014)
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