A Spatio-temporal Analysis of Commercial Parks in Cape Town, South Africa

Cities undergo constant change and their industrial spaces are particularly impacted on by new technologies, changing industries and the vagaries of the global and national economies. This paper reports on an investigation of the changing commercial and industrial landscape in Cape Town, South Africa, by focussing on commercial park spaces, specifically those that have been purposely named as business parks, industrial parks and office parks. The study is grounded in the literature on the changing spatial economy of Cape Town. A comprehensive database of commercial parks was created from a host of online sources and documents as well as a field survey. The spatial distribution of commercial parks was analysed in relation to the 11 districts mapped by a previous spatial economic study of the city. It was found that while the commercial parks were predominantly located in four districts, a nuanced locational analysis of the three different types of parks provided evidence of subtle differences in their distribution. The commercial parks are located both in traditional industrial suburbs and in newer commercial spaces and, although most are new developments, some are housed in old industrial spaces that have been converted. Almost half of the commercial parks are managed as sectional title schemes which mirror the management model of gated communities. Purposely named commercial parks are essentially a post-apartheid phenomenon as the majority are post-1994 developments.