Inclusive Urban Campus Development: A Case for Okahandja, Namibia

Abstract

As a result of the high rate of urbanization and the attendant growth in housing demand and proliferation of informal settlements in sub-Saharan African countries such as Namibia, the development of cities has become a priority concern of the governments given the obvious socio-economic and environmental challenges that impact sustainable infrastructure/services, quality of life, health and well-being of the citizenry as referenced in the United Nation Sustainable Development Goal (UN SDG) Number 11. Whereas the governments are conscious of these daunting challenges, they remain unable to decipher sustainable solutions to them. The consequence is the perennial proliferation of informal settlements, housing shortages, and urban poverty, pressure on infrastructure and services, and unemployment. Although dubbed a “Garden Town” Okahandja does not have an urban structure plan of development. This study aims to investigate the feasibility of socially inclusive urban infrastructure campus development using Okahandja as a platform. Recent research has revealed such trends as the smart city concept which embodies a sustainable approach to Inclusive Urban Campus (IUC) development towards a holistic community planning in third world countries. Dololo site in the south of Okahandja stands out as an opportune urban campus platform for diverse mixed-use including residential, business-related (entrepreneurial), educational, recreational, and others. The research employed a novel multi-focused workshop methodology for data collection with community engagement and stakeholders’ interactive participation as a key strategy to enhance the bottom-up development approach. The objectives were to identify the town planning and integrated development dynamics of Okahandja, the policy bottlenecks, expose sustainable forms of socio-cultural integration and formal housing delivery. Ultimately, the feasibility of Dololo as a platform for the inclusive urban campus initiative was not in doubt. Infrastructural development and community need to accommodate education, Small and Medium Enterprise (SME), Vocational Training Center (VTC), informal trade, housing, health, youth centers, cooperatives, roads, and transport are identified as key to the IUC development.