Racial land zoning in urban South Africa

The imposition of the policy of apartheid upon South African urban areas after the National Party electoral victory in 1948, led to profound changes in spatial planning and population distribution. All urban places were zoned with sectors set aside for the mutually exclusive ownership and occupation of legally defined racial groups. Between 1950 and 1991 over 1 million hectares of urban land were zoned in racial terms. Massive population movements took place to fit the population to the plans, which had built-in disparities between groups in access to urban land. Even with the repeal of this legislation, South African cities exhibit the heritage of apartheid planning, with the racially defined zones still apparent in the urban form.