| Summary: | Apartheid city planning ensured that different races lived separately. Non Whites i.e. Coloureds, Indians and African Blacks were sited far from city centres and from the public amenities closer to the wealthier parts of the city. Black residential settlements in particular, did not have proper:-(i) drainage (ii) roads (iii) libraries (iv) post-offices (v) sports fields (vi) public swimming pool for children (vii) bioscope arena and (viii) old age homes for the senior citizens. The mushrooming of the squatter camps in the Durban Functional area during the 80 's has been an indication that Blacks needed other basic urban infrastructure. They wanted to reside near the city centre where most of them sold their labour. When political violence erupted in the rural areas of KZN (after the unbanning of political organizations, mainly the African National Congress) people moved away from the violence - stricken areas to places near the city where they erected temporary structures, the shacks or "imijondolo ' in the Zulu language. After 1994 the Government of National Unity (the first democratically elected government) came with new initiatives to improve the living conditions in the shack villages. For the first time the Metro City planning policy system took informal settlement into consideration. Through the new government housing approach the poor were granted the housing subsidy which would enable them to own a new home in a place closer to their place of work. Canaan informal settlement could not be upgraded because of the landslide. Instead residents of Canaan were relocated to Quarry Heights where they now have access to proper infrastructure. The community now has access to electricity, clean water, properly constructed roads with streetlights and proper sewerage. This paper demonstrates that the beneficiaries of Quarry Heights have been the rightful recipients of the new product. They now live under improved conditions. The housing project/product of Quarry Heights, it seems has reached the intended target group, which is the poorest of the poor. The state is gradually meeting the needs of the homeless, their wants' are being prioritized and redressed. === Thesis (M.A.)-University of KwaZulu-Natal, 2005.
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