ABSTRACT
This chapter focuses on the invisible geographies present in urban spaces by looking closely at the Cassim family history. It invites contemporary planners to look closely at the lived reality and embedded histories of areas before imposing sweeping visions. New development plans by city planners and private developers cast Jeppestown as a failed area that requires a reversal of apartheid city planning. The Cassim family offers one example of how people created a home and livelihood in the grey areas that escaped rigid apartheid policy and a highly controlled segregated city. Early Jeppestown, in many ways resembles a model of urban planning not dissimilar from how the Spatial Development Framework describes the Johannesburg 2040 project—self-sufficient corridors where people live, work, and have access to transportation across the city. However, the success of Jeppestown as a residential area, according to prominent historiography of the city, was short lived.
