Abstract
The middle-income group in Nairobi, as in many other sub-Saharan African cities, is of a significant size. Many housing developments aimed at the middle-income group in Nairobi do not comply with planning laws and regulations. The costs of non-compliance include loss of lives when buildings collapse. This chapter investigates why there is non-compliance with building laws and regulations.
The study finds that, despite conflicting interests in the application of planning laws and regulations, non-compliance is tolerated or ignored because there is an informal collaboration in the development of middle-income housing that benefits public and private actors, namely government planners and private developers. This validates the indispensability of these developments.
The study asserts that non-compliance in such developments does not necessarily produce inappropriate housing developments. Rather than fighting these developments, livability and housing needs could be better served by positive and formal partnership between planners, developers and other stakeholders, to secure acceptable and affordable housing developments.
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Notes
- 1.
It implied a quid pro quo arrangement.
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Mwangi, M.M. (2020). Production of Middle-Class Residential Developments in Nairobi: Informal Collaboration Between Developers and Urban Planners. In: van Montfort, C., Michels, A. (eds) Partnerships for Livable Cities. Palgrave Macmillan, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-40060-6_6
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