Faculty of Engineering and Built Environment
Permanent URI for this communityhttp://ir-dev.dut.ac.za/handle/10321/9
Browse
2 results
Search Results
Item A very ordinary power : The evolution of the electrical substation in Pietermaritzburg, 1900-1960(School for Basic Sciences, Vaal Triangle Campus, North-West University, 2014) Whelan, DebbiePietermaritzburg is a city in KwaZulu-Natal, South Africa, characterised by a central core of late Victorian-era buildings. It was in this period that electrification arrived, bringing with it new challenges in the provision of infrastructure and its ancillary requirements. One such adjunct to electrification was the need to provide for structures to house transformers and substations and these had to be integrated into an already existing urban infrastructure. As primarily utilitarian buildings, they had a single function which was to house the mechanisms of electrical power. However, simultaneously, they had to exist as palatable pieces of architecture within an already largely constructed city-scape. This cogent awareness of built environment is reflected in the design of many of the substations, which are modest, constructed within the prevailing architectural style of the time, and as a result blend in entirely with the city fabric as it exists. They also tell the story of the arrival of one of the cornerstones of our modern existence, namely power, and elucidate its part in the creation of new areas of the city and the march of “progress” from the centre outwards.Item eMatsheni: The central beer hall as social and municipal infrastructure in twentieth century Pietermaritzburg(SciELO South Africa, 2015-05) Whelan, DebbieSouthern African cities have quietly developed by plugging new civic infrastructure that supported their operations into the urban environment, often with ad hoc decisions eliciting public outcry. Occasionally, legislative imperatives led to active protest, particularly the implementation of early versions of Group Area legislation. In the early twentieth century, the Pietermaritzburg corporation was torn between the need to accommodate Africans within the city for labour purposes and simultaneously, the need to follow legislations which restricted exactly this. Accommodating labour was the key component of the Durban System allowing for the control of African beer consumption while providing vital municipal revenue. The requisite buildings thus formed a vital part of city infrastructure. The original central beer hall was located close to the city hall and other important centres of civic society. It was marked for closure in the early 1930s, and reconstructed in a part of the city populated largely by mixed race and Indian people who protested vociferously at its development. This article discusses the public consultation process and the formation of the beer hall as a core of African-centred development on the periphery of the city. It concludes by commenting on the structures in contemporary Pietermaritzburg and their potential for future, meaningful development.