ABSTRACT
As a consequence of the growth in population and the rural exodus after the Second World War in Senegal, the city's administration of Dakar published a new plan of urban development for the whole area of the peninsula of Cap-Verde in 1946. This plan aimed at transforming the city into a ‘symbol of modernity’. It featured the restructuring of the area into different functional districts, the development of infrastructure (including the construction of the highway of Dakar), and the erection of administrative buildings, governmental complexes and tower blocks in the city centre. One of the basic elements of urban planning consisted in the setting-up of new residential areas and the urban clearance of so-called ‘popular’ neighbourhoods or shanty towns (Dione 1992). A by-product of this programme was the creation of the city of Pikine which was founded in 1952 on a former military camp about 13 kilometers from the centre of Dakar.
