Johannesburg travel guide
Its Zulu name is eGoli: City of Gold. Johannesburg is the heart of South Africa’s industrial and commercial life, where more than a mile below bustling city traffic, miners dig for the world’s most precious metal. At street level, stockbrokers and company directors rub shoulders with street vendors and traditional healers. Ultra-modern corporate towers dwarf noisy pavement stalls. It’s the official capital of Gauteng Province, and many residents of Jo’burg or Jozi – as it’s known informally – regard it to be the ipso-facto capital of South Africa, and will fervently defend it against the more obvious charms of places like that sleepy visdorpie (fishing village) Cape Town.
Ever since a fateful day in 1886 when George Harrison, a humble prospector, stumbled upon an outcrop of gold-bearing rock, the region’s economy and life have been driven by the pulsating rhythm of the mining industry. The effects are inescapable.
Sprawling metropolis
Take an elevator to the 50th floor of the Carlton Centre, the tallest building in Africa at 223 metres (730ft), and you see tawny mine dumps and shaft -headgears dotting the -skyline. Walk the streets of downtown Johannesburg, and you find road and building names vividly evoking the gold-rush days.
Harrison’s discovery sparked a gold fever never experienced before or since, anywhere in the world. Prospectors and fortune-seekers descended on the area in search of instant wealth. Makeshift shelters and tents mushroomed all over the tranquil veld. A sprawling, rough and raucous shanty town sprang up almost overnight. Within three years, Johannesburg was the largest town in South Africa. A rudimentary stock exchange was established. Men outnumbered women three to one. Hotels and canteens, brothels and music halls were erected throughout the town to satisfy the needs of this boisterous new community. But it wasn’t long before fledgling mining corporations moved in to take control of the industry and swallow up individual claims. “Randlords” like Cecil John Rhodes, Barney Barnato and Alfred Beit quickly accumulated huge fortunes, imposing a semblance of order on the unruly mining town in their wake.
Today, Johannesburg forms the hub of a sprawling metropolis called the Witwatersrand (Ridge of White Waters), stretching more than 120km (75 miles) from Springs in the east to Randfontein in the west, with a -rapidly growing population of at least 5 million. The Witwatersrand is the core of Gauteng and the place where all the country’s major industries are based – making this the undisputed powerhouse of sub-Saharan Africa.
A diverse and divided city
By global standards, Johannesburg is a medium-sized city, at least in terms of population, though it must rank as one of the world’s most spread-out urban centres, due to a tendency towards lateral rather than vertical growth. And in the African context, it is a giant, offering some of the continent’s best nightlife, hotels and shopping opportunities. Yet nowhere are the contrasts that typify the place so forcefully experienced as in the busy downtown area.
In the 1990s, violent crime became such a problem in downtown Johannesburg that many local businesses relocated to safer suburbs and the upmarket hotels that once graced its streets were forced to close or to convert to low-rental apartment blocks. Since the turn of the millennium, however, central Johannesburg has experienced considerable urban rejuvenation, epitomised by the developments around Newtown, and crime is widely thought to be on the decrease. Still, the safest way to see the city centre is on an organised tour. It’s probably inadvisable to walk around the city centre without a local companion who knows the ropes, especially after dark, and – as in any city centre, only more so – it would be inviting trouble to carry a camera, or wear expensive jewellery, or flash a loaded wallet. If you’re driving, it’s a good idea to keep your car doors locked at all times.
Places to visit in Johannesburg
Museum Africa
tel: 011-833 5624
Foremost among the Newtown Precinct’s museums is Museum Africa whose innovative displays depict scenes from Johannesburg’s brief but turbulent history. You’ll find, for example, a cluster of squatter shacks brought from Alexandra township and painstakingly reconstructed; displays focusing on the Rivonia Treason Trial, which sentenced Nelson Mandela to life imprisonment on Robben Island; even a fearsome assortment of home-made weapons confiscated from a miners’ hostel. Museum Africa also houses a Geological Museum, displaying some of the country’s unique mineral wealth, and the Bensusan Museum of Photography.
Market Theatre
Margaret Mcingana Street
tel: 011-832 1641
Next door to the Precinct complex, the Market Theatre was the home of protest theatre in the 1970s and ’80s, and a renowned cornerstone of the intellectual revolution against apartheid. Today, it is an arts complex in its own right, housing art and photographic galleries, a jazz venue and the legendary Gramadoelas Restaurant, which was founded in 1967 and whose sumptuous pan-African cuisine has attracted the prestigious likes of Queen Elizabeth II and Bill Clinton.
Johannesburg Art Gallery
tel: 011-725 3130
The central Johannesburg Art Gallery celebrated its centenary in 2010. The gallery was designed by Sir Edwin Lutyens, houses a collection of almost 10,000 artworks representing all styles and era in South African art. Unfortunately, it lies in Joubert Park, one of Johannesburg’s most crime-ridden quarters, so is best not visited on foot.
Origins Centre
corner of Yale Road and Enoch Sontonga Avenue
tel: 011-717 4700
Part of the prestigious university, the Origins Centre, opened by President Mbeki in 2006, is a world-class modern museum that explores the emergence of modern humankind in two related sets of displays. The first is dedicated to human evolution as documented by a wealth of fossils unearthed in Gauteng and elsewhere in Africa, while the second houses what is claimed to be the world’s largest collection of prehistoric rock art, including some of the earliest surviving images made by man.
Read more from the travel guide to South Africa