Lecture Three History of Nairobi
Lecture Three History of Nairobi
Lecture Three History of Nairobi
LECTURE 3
A BRIEF HISTORY OF NAIROBI: EVOLUTION OF
THE BUILT ENVIRONMENT
– 1899: Nairobi began as a stop-over
for Kenya-Uganda railway.
– Outside municipality,
beyond Dagoretti Rd
Kenya Armed Rifles
occupied quarters.
1910/20s
Station Road 1913
1913
1913
Nrb Boundaries 1906-1963
– Before 1920 Nairobi defined no – These neighbourhoods had
“native locations” and erected amenities e.g. communal kitchens,
no African residential quarters. welfare clinics, libraries, dance
halls, tea rooms, and football
– Pumwani and Pangani were areas grounds.
for early housing for Africans. 1st – The ‘village green’, the social
African public housing scheme centre, a post office, a dairy, were
was Kariokor comprising incorporated into design, which
dormitory-type quarters. deviated from the gridiron
layout customary elsewhere in
– Other projects: Ziwani: a municipal Africa at the time.
housing experiment; Starehe: a
government scheme; and Kaloleni:
a joint venture of government and
municipality.
– After World War 1,
European settlers
gained more influence
in colonial
administration. The
European-dominated
municipality employed
town planning and zoning
of areas.
– Another commercial
concentration developed NW
of the city centre, on the
western side of Koinange
Street. With few exceptions,
new administrative and
commercial buildings in the
city centre conformed to the
modernist ‘International Style’
of buildings.
– By 1983, primacy of the city
centre so evident in the early 1960s,
replaced by sub-centres in the
residential areas, with the largest
at Westlands attracting commercial
services, companies and hotels.