In colaboration with the Transitional Metro council of Johannesburg an evaluation of the building s stock in the Old CBD was crucual, as urban decay was setting in fast, building were being overcrowded and squatted, or simply locked up. Other buildings were abandoned by owners who could not pay rates and taxes and service, as well as the building being hijacked, which means taken over by a slumlord and rented out. This was all happning in and around the central financial district, the stock exchange and the all the financial structures that held the city together, like mining houses, the big insurance companies that all owned their own buildings and even a few city blocks. But all the small business was in chaos, and the municipality did not know how to proceed. We were commissioned by the Johannesburg city council to produce a research document on the condition of the existing building fabric in the rapidly decaying inner city.
We supplied the council with a data base of every urban feature on public and private land. This includes buildings, parks , fountains, city infrastructure, sculptures and monuments, squares and marketplaces. Every feature had all its information compiled from the council arquives, which were disorganized and decaying: Construction dates, Arquitects name, alterations, building use and type style etc. This included foto documentation, recommendations if it was suitable for housing as the apartheid city had no housing in the CBD.The first part of the study was tro establish was was architecturally valuable, the monuments and the possible future monuments. The next was to establish which buildings were in a state of decay. Then in colaboration with the Municipal GIS department a digital 3D map was to be made which contained more than just spatial information, but where one could see if a building had plans and was legal, to if the rates and services payments.