Pietermaritzburg Central Area Survey – A Study of Accommodation and Parking in the Central Area of the City of Pietermaritzburg by Town and Regional Planning Commission, Natal

Pietermaritzburg Central Area Survey – A Study of Accommodation and Parking in the Central Area of the City of Pietermaritzburg was published as Volume 2 of the Natal Town & Regional Planning Reports by the Town and Regional Planning Commission, Natal. This copy is the second impression of June 1961 (first impression February 1960), printed by Penrose Press, Pietermaritzburg, in landscape format.

Pietermaritzburg Central Area Survey was carried out by the Commission in association with the Department of Architecture, University of Natal. It was directed by M. J. Rosenberg, Assistant Provincial Town and Regional Planner, under Provincial Town and Regional Planner E. Thorrington-Smith and Professor P. H. Connell, Head of the Department of Architecture, with fieldwork supervised by R. B. Lewcock. The foreword is by Dr G. C. Scully, Acting Chairman of the Commission, who explains that the survey began in 1956 because there was almost no South African data on how city centres were working.

Pietermaritzburg Central Area Survey records the city centre building by building: ground-floor and upper-floor uses, site coverage, floor area ratios, building heights and ages, the daytime working population, residents of flats and hotels, how people came to work, and the number of cars brought into the city. Parked cars were counted on a Thursday morning, a Thursday afternoon and a Saturday morning. The data was processed on Hollerith punched-card machines, an early use of mechanical computing in South African planning, and the book includes aerial traffic-count photographs, the survey forms and the circular letter sent to property owners, along with extensive tables.

Pietermaritzburg Central Area Survey is a valuable snapshot of central Pietermaritzburg at the start of the 1960s, and will interest collectors of Natal and Pietermaritzburg history, town planners, architects, urban historians and researchers.

Condition – Very Good

Bound in hard boards with a cloth spine, in very good condition. A previous owner’s bookplate is fixed to the inside front cover. Foxing is present. All 20 fold-out plates are fixed in place and complete, and the two loose insert papers are present as issued.