Background of Area | Project Overview | Community Meeting | The Way Forward | ALL MULTIMEDIA

Our group was tasked with surveying the area of the Grahamstown CBD and Oatlands. This included High Street and New Street, Bathurst through to Hill Street and all the way down African street as well.  When looking specifically at African street, one of the central meeting places was Peppergrove Mall. This shopping hub is filled with businesses, ranging from the Pharmacy to a liquor store, Roxbury cinema, home industries, and clothing boutiques and of course Pick n Pay. Most complaints were of petty crime. The instances of crime are low as the Mall is secured with a perimetre wall and High Tec security. 

Oatlands is a residential area. Most residents have fences and barbed wire around their property, indicating that robberies are frequent in this area. Further down from the houses and the nursery school, a different Oatlands appears. There is graffiti on the walls, litter scattered everywhere and broken glass in the road. There is a large field located near the bottom, on which the Bowling Club is situated.

High Street begins from the arch. It has many businesses- made up of formal and informal; old and new, franchises, family businesses, clothing, food, restaurants, hotels, b n b’s and liquors stores.The higher income bracket customers tend to be concentrated higher up High street, around the hotels and fancy high- brow restaurants near Somerset. Whereas lower down the Street one finds more traffic- taxis, begging street children and street vendors.

Moving towards Bathurst Street, the area is mainly business orientated with few residential properties. The business sector is less formal though and the income of the people concentrated in this area are lower than that of the High Street/New Street area. 

Lower end of High Street, Grahamstown.

Upper end of High Street, Grahamstown