Durban’s Journey: From Swamp to City - A Century of Transformation

[@anchoragealaska3104]

From swamp to city to swamp again….thanks Comrades

[@rodgerhargoon3402]

London was also a beautiful town until a certain people were voted in to take charge ......what happened?????..😅😅😅😅

[@jiggsborah7041]

Full circle.

[@stanleynkosikamthembu168]

My first thought after seeing, reading the topic. And ten how do we describe the current mess, de-transformation?

[@trevorstieger6762]

Yes well done to all the comrades. 😂

[@stanleynkosikamthembu168]

@@trevorstieger6762 Its not only "comrades" responsible for the mess our country is in. Remember post 1994, a coterie of everyone from the apartheid government (national party), so-called Bantustans were part of the Government. While some black joined the ANC after seeing where the grass has greened and were then called "comrades" when they were not. Thus, the buck stopped with the ANC but the blame could well be spread to all these diverse group of public servants and public representatives.

[@Hongaars1969]

Durban had the potential to become a great city like Perth or Brisbane. This video is a treasure to behold.

[@ericacutten5593]

@@Hongaars1969 Durban is still vastly better than Perth!

[@Hongaars1969]

@ infrastructure wise, it (sadly) definitely isn’t.

[@trevorstieger6762]

And crime wise

[@ericacutten5593]

@@Hongaars1969 Durban has lovely people

[@Hongaars1969]

@ as does Perth and Brisbane. I’ve been to Durban many times in my life including most recently 2 years ago. PS. I’m not South African by birth but grew up in Pretoria and I’ve lived in several countries including New Zealand and Australia. Every place I’ve lived in has beautiful people. Cheers from Dubrovnik Croatia where I presently reside. Regards. Zoltán.

[@insanitywithin1]

30 years under anc has made Durban a no go place

[@itsnevertoolatetodotherigh3271]

I don't know where you live but everyone is allowed in Durban

[@julie-annhamar4884]

What incredible footage saved. Thank you. It shows a Durban that one can only imagine. I grew up near the botanic gardens in the 70's & 80's. It was fun being a street kid then 😜

[@jeanpierreroux5087]

What rich history, pearls thrown to swine

[@mrjames5635]

twig, straw and mud. same technology for 50000 yrs today....

[@johntaplin3126]

History shows that progress is not necessarily always an upward curve. The past 30 years has reiterated that fact.

[@kentimmins9171]

Wrong culture,wasn't ready to maintain this

[@eeveegg6onpc507]

"Keep ....out of maintaining and governing...". 🤣🤣🤣🤣....you didn't even hit the stage to invent the wheel yet...blame yourself

[@irbis_rosh]

@@eeveegg6onpc507 considering I am of Central Asian and Middle Eastern descend, my ancestors did in fact invent the wheel and gave it to the world, as well as domesticating the horse. They also gave you agriculture: which we developed in the Neolithic while Northern Europeans, roughly speaking, didn't even climb down from trees yet🤣. Talking about hitting the stage ayayayai🤣

[@chriserasmus]

@@johntaplin3126 its called reverse evolution. It is working and real

[@nelsonchinasamy9857]

I left KZN and moved to Cape Town 24 years ago. I visited DURBAN in September 2024 and was shocked at what I saw. Your title says 'FROM SWAMP TO CITY', what I saw was a reversal, a city going backwards, FROM CITY TO SWAMP . Thanks for the ANC.

[@louisbester2627]

Whatever King Midas touched turned to gold, whatever the ANC touches turns to sewerage😢

[@JoanneBuckle]

Incredibly sad, what a site to see now.😢

[@Fayefreeman]

Cry beloved city Durban 😢

[@SoulBuddy2222]

Just smile all the way to Umhlanga or Ballito. Umhlanga is part of Durban, in case you didn't know. Even London, Paris and New York have some bad areas. They are usually populated by immigrants, which is also the case in South Africa. Immigrants have taken over most South African city centers, and businesses have expanded outward to avoid the chaos.

[@telehova]

I saw myself dancing with my wife at Mitchell Park in 1936, we’ve been together for 172 years now and I still love her ❤

[@EUGENEDESIGNER]

hahahahahahahhahahahahahaha we would know of you Sir

[@brendanwood5213]

Funny but math is most certainly not your string point 😂

[@danyalmarks5412]

Wow. So glad to know that young couples are sticking together despite difficulties. You're an inspiration to other fellow youths

[@m.a.n.m.a.g]

@@brendanwood5213Strong**

[@MrKamenyaa]

DANG

[@Natsha-u8v]

Once a beautiful thriving place...sadly n9 more😢

[@bobrobertsNotUrBob]

Wow, nice find, thank you

[@Tekweni]

You're welcome! 😊

[@Scott.Silburn]

Thank you for this lovely and fascinating presentation. I wonder when it was created? It certainly gives me a greater sense of connection with this lovely city which I call home... And, indeed, gives me hope that Durban can once again rise from the calamitous neglect of its current 'management'...

[@wiekusvandernest7063]

Dream on, and on and on and on

[@SoulBuddy2222]

​@@wiekusvandernest7063Umhlanga is part of Durban by the way, and it's beautiful. There is a good partnership between business and government there. So, it's not just a dream, but reality in some parts of Durban. Any city needs business involvement to be desirable or to improve. Cape Town wouldn't be what it is without business involvement. Durban started deteriorating before ANC, but then got worse. I saw it, because I lived there in 1991. Why, some old buildings never got renovated, and then attracted wrong people into the city. These buildings were not owned by black people.

[@Not2Seriaaas]

Wow! Drone footage from back then is impressive 😀😀😀

[@Reasonablyneutral]

Magnificent!!

[@HeatherGiddings]

Hate to see Durban has gone down so badly , once a good holiday destination now we just stay away very sad 😢.

[@EllamaJimmy]

This is Africa NOT Europa!!!!😂

[@eeveegg6onpc507]

You just confirmed Africa is a dump?🤣🤣

[@SoulBuddy2222]

Why don't you go to Umhlanga, Ramsgate, Toti, Ballito, Scorburgh, Margate, Pennington, Uvongo, Umdloti, Port Edward etc etc. If you can’t afford the North Coast, simply go to the South Coast. KZN is stunning, and I can't get enough of it.😅😅😅

[@SoulBuddy2222]

Did I forget the midlands and underberg, as well as the far north, St Lucia. Why are you so obsessed with the CBD, even the promenade area is beautiful. The only problem is the inner part which started deteriorating before ANC, when white landlords stopped renovating their buildings, and abandoned them. This created all sorts of problems in the city, by attracting wrong people to dilapidated buildings.

[@SoulBuddy2222]

By the way I started living in the Durban CBD in 1991 before the ANC, and it was already on the decline because of some old buildings, which were not being renovated by private owners.

[@chriserasmus]

I was never a believer in Darwins evolution theory. I am more convinced that the theory could be not so far fetched if I see how this place is rapidly returning to prehistoric times.

[@joshgovender6386]

Oh wow awesome video guys an well done in just dropping names of people who are the places we know. Brilliant

[@SoulBuddy2222]

It's funny how everyone seems to suggest that Durban looked like this just before the ANC took over.😅😅😅 I lived in the Durban CBD from 1991, well before the ANC took over, and there were a number of dilapidated buildings already. Things did get worse under the ANC, but they had been getting worse even before the ANC. It's also funny how Umhlanga, which is part of Durban seems to be excluded deliberately to paint the worst picture about Durban. The truth about Durban today is: it has beautiful places, average places and bad places. If you focus on beautiful places, you'll have a great time, and if you focus on bad places you'll have horrible time.😅

[@andretait2817]

1991 the writing was already on the wall.

[@wasa213]

Interesting comment. Why is it that Durban was and continues to be undermined and ignored since those days as it always had the potential to be the next Miami?

[@sahirebrahim6412]

I have to disagree with you because we didn't have so many illegal foreigners before 1994, have u been to the umbilo area , the maydon wharf , most of Dbn CBD, it is practically a no go areas. We now don't have a few dilapidated buildings, we have whole areas that have become unrecognisable. I love the New South Africa because in the old SA my family lived much harder lives but we can't hide behind the fact that this government we have voted for has somewhat let us down.

[@vmaxmadness]

A beautiful vibrant and clean city turned into a pit toilet.

[@AbsolutelyRufus-o1h]

It’s gone full circle now... back to being a swamp.

[@almadlicka2410]

Back to swamp 2025

[@Spyro_2076]

This needs a part 2

[@samuelbhagothiparsad3882]

......and back to an even filthier swamp and bushland....

[@ericacutten5593]

I grew up in 1950s Durban Don't want to see the destruction

[@gavinknox2168]

Now back to the swamp of sewerage.... ANC progress....

[@Galaxyeyez]

I want this but for Pretoria and Johannesburg. I know we have a problematic history but I'd like to learn more things about our past besides the struggle. Edit: And not a single brown or black face to be seen. 😔 Wish we had all lived together equally from the start.

[@clownbooface2624]

Brown and black people's was living in their homelands still , not every one was a servant, only rich could afford it much like anywhere else in the world at that time, normal everyday ppl sweat for themselves

[@robertcarr4172]

So lovely. Look how fancy people used to dress. Such class

[@andrewst9797]

What a beautiful and civilised city Durban was. Shame it is now 'gone to the dogs', along with so many others

[@ericacutten5593]

@@andrewst9797 More English than England

[@Scar_7.62]

Many don't realise the Durban area was the indigenous homeland of the Khoi and San people before the Bantu invaded and colonised them .

[@SoulBuddy2222]

What's the point? Most of Southern Africa was occupied by the Khoi and San people. So, you can go to Cape Town, Botswana or Namibia and make the same claims. The claims have become irrelevant because the Khoi and the San have become almost extinct. And by the way, coloureds are not the only ones who are descendants of the KhoiSan. Many Bantus are also descendants, e.g. Mandela, because there was a lot of mixing.

[@Scar_7.62]

@SoulBuddy2222 what's the point ?!!! Genocide is the point . The Natal KHOI-SAN were wiped out by the zulu . They killed all the men and absorbed the women and children into the tribe . The xhosa did almost the same in the eastern Cape . The local clans of KHOI and SAN were extinguished as an independent people . Xhosa colonisation dessimated and ended their original true identity completely .

[@ManuelDumont-l1w]

​​@@SoulBuddy2222"a lot of mixing"??...more like Forced-CHATTELS, of the the KhoiSan-women(after their men were DECIMATED) . 🙄

[@zamo9266]

FYI those people you speak about are black

[@agrid2608]

This is a meaningless & factless statement. Khoi was a reference label to pastoralists. San to hunter-gatherers. Thousands of years ago the area around the Congo and Southwards was African pygmy by hypothesis. Then came the advent of the proto-agrarian from East Africa. There were no population sizes or modern polities for "invasion" or colonisation". That's European projection. The SA native has been a blend of African pygmy & proto-agrarian for millennia. As evidenced by the L0 haplogroup the modern cultural Bantu is exactly that blend. And thus the ancient millennia-old native lineage by the tens of millions. People seem confused by labels, nor do they understand how generational offspring works.

[@parrotafrica2996]

Imagine living in kzn in 1886 😮

[@lizrain8306]

I wonder how they got the high, moving camera angles on some of the old footage?😮 they were only new to photos.

[@clownbooface2624]

Small open cockpit biplanes

[@worskaas]

Why don't I see any Indians or Zulus in the video?

[@pierrehofmeyr2188]

They can't swim..

[@jn8922]

That's because they weren't living this life. The blacks were on their homelands and the Indians were living in tin shacks on the farms

[@pevenmadilaneysmitt8462]

All I see are black and white

[@nashsingh1349]

You're not racist, obviously.... ​@@pierrehofmeyr2188

[@ericacutten5593]

@@worskaas Indians were often market gardeners. I remember their gardens next to Edwin Swales Drive.

[@debrabeck6068]

Fabulous footage. Durban is still beautiful and more diverse. Like cities adapt so must its citizens.

[@ManuelDumont-l1w]

Who wants to be an EFFing(racist)ANCorrupt>CADre ??

[@PlanetPlutour]

Brohhh , White Pipul invested a lot to make Durban great at that time , I feel very sad to see how Durban is today but then again I think old white folks must be having the feeling 100x

[@WORLD_NEWZ]

They forgot this was our indigenous country.

[@PaulAustin-u4h]

Well just squatters to tell the truth.

[@clownbooface2624]

Nope, u come down from central Africa on foot and murdered the khoi pples

[@mthokozisivusanene8610]

It was a BEAUTIFUL Time to be Caucasian, not that it's Worse Now! Wish this Documentary talked More about how the Land Areas Act made an effect on the City and it would be Informative to get Architectural and City Planning History and Designs! Appreciate this Great Insight to Our Perculiar History

[@SoulBuddy2222]

I started living in Durban in 1991, and the decline had already started setting in because of dilapidated buildings, which belonged to absent, greedy and negligent landlords, none of whom were African.

[@MáiGiàng-n9o]

🎉🎉🎉🎉🎉🎉🎉🎉🎉🎉

[@gerhardkruger7157]

Enjoyed the video... My my, Durban has changed... perhaps President Trump has a point!

[@Galaxyeyez]

And what point might that be if I may ask?

[@lowjoe246]

Let me clarify.. $h!thol€

[@gerhardkruger7157]

@@Galaxyeyez that South Africa,perhaps,maybe, perchance,by pure luck may be a ........

[@Galaxyeyez]

@@gerhardkruger7157 "may be a..." What?

[@TickleThatFancy]

😂😂😂😂😂

[@thabisomaluleka-r5l]

If only there was no Segregation 😢

[@ManuelDumont-l1w]

Your(enslaving)

[@turquoisetreee]

05:02 the bug on the screen 😂

[@patel786]

This sounds like "a land without a people for a people without a land". There's 1 glaring thing missing from this, the native people whose land was stolen.

[@pevenmadilaneysmitt8462]

Once a swamp to Paradise then into a dump

[@rudolfhough6226]

The narator , with his bored British accent , could not get himself to mention Republic day on 31 May 1961. It was the day Durban stopped being part of the British Empire and that was also not mentioned. They must have detested the Afrikaans government very much. And we are reminded to this day where Jan Smuts,s heart lay.

[@mj3299]

Nou praat jy. Maar Natal en meer spesifiek Durban het nog altyd vir my soos 'n deel van Engeland gevoel.

[@marialovespalmtrees]

Fast forward 100 yrs - a city of filth, delapidation and embarrassment. 😭 From beauty, sophistication and civilisation to absolute barbarity and chaos.

[@Wuzmu]

Look at all these zulus building this city from the ground up! Amazing!!!!😂😂😂

[@SoulBuddy2222]

They wouldn't let them do such an easy and decent job. They had to force them to go to the mines, where they would dig up gold for them or die trying. They imposed taxes on the Zulus on their wealth (cattle) to force them into cheap labour in the mines, that was hard and dangerous. Read up on the Bhambatha rebellion. They did this after the Zulus had refused to work in the sugar plantations, and the Indians had to be shipped in. So, the whites did work, but they just chose to do only what they liked, and enslaved others to do what they didn't like or was too dangerous.

[@SoulBuddy2222]

I am a proud Zulu by the way. When the settlers came to KZN, there were more cattle than people and no poverty. That soon changed for the worse after the arrival of the settlers.😢😢😢

[@clownbooface2624]

A good tradesman knows how to use his tools

[@marnime]

​@@SoulBuddy2222 you don't have to though. I'm sure there's enough space in rural KZN so you can go back to your indigenous roots?

[@JJtheJetplane-z5s]

Why did they decommission the electric tram system?

[@theonlydavide]

Busses and cars took over.

[@ericacutten5593]

@@theonlydavide Trolley buses

[@theonlydavide]

​@@ericacutten5593it's as if Durban has regressed, from having a once very impressive and ahead of it's time public transport system, to what we have today.

[@yusufrajah2952]

​@@theonlydavide so true Thinking the exact same thing

[@mj3299]

Stupidity, but in those days petrol was cheap. We never reached the underground rails of Europe , but this would have been a great alternative. Infrastructure like this is costly to maintain and expand, but would have been far better than the taxis we have today.

[@jasonyu-gi-oh1056]

So this film is from 1954?

[@Tekweni]

This documentary was edited in the 1970s, but it features historical footage dating back to the early 1900s, and includes events well beyond 1954. In other words, it isn’t solely from 1954-it’s a blend of various eras all captured in one film.

[@Trevelin-rc5zu]

Durban is now gone six foot under Not the way it used to be .

[@mercedesrisch3377]

Please study history before you consent South Africa was and open country for all that wanted to come work and live like today and not destroyed

[@voshonews]

After seeing this I'm disappointed, ahh current politicians turns us down 😢

[@driesmyburgh9950]

What a mistake to invest in holiday accommodation 40 years ago!😢

[@francina8343]

They build many bars and bar cabinets furniture 😂😂😂😂

[@curtvannieuwenhuizen398]

Where are the Black representatives of the people

[@lion_nation]

A project of international Freemasonry, built by the same Freemasons who built Perth, Vancouver etc.

[@marnime]

Maybe it's time to build elsewhere? 😊

[@lion_nation]

@@marnime they are the destroyers who rebuild

[@KeyBordWarrior]

home sweet home...

[@keep_it_tidy56]

Great to see the footage of General Smuts, the finest statesman SA ever had, and will ever have. Nice to see the real SA flag flying, not the advert for Y fronts that nowadays masquerades as a flag. We walked the Durban promenade a few weeks ago, 6km from the start all the way to the harbour. The area around central Durban is a sorry sight, rubbish lying around, security everywhere & general decay. Up to mid-nineties: growth, from then on: decline. Very sad for this once great city.

[@SoulBuddy2222]

I am a black South African who started living in the Durban CBD in 1991. There was already a lot of decline. Indian dominated areas were the worst part of Durban, but other areas as well, e.g. along the Point road, where there were prostitutes. There were already dilapidated buildings of absent landlords or negligent landlords. I initially occupied a cheap building without proper facilities for a few months, but later moved out to a better building. This was way before the ANC took over. When the ANC took over the inner city continued to deteriorate, but they greatly improved the promenade just before the 2010 World Cup. Yes, the ANC hasn't done a great job in Durban CBD, but the same can be said about those who were in charge just before the ANC. What Durban was in the old days, is what Umhlanga is in the modern times. So, it's not all doom and gloom for greater Durban. Umhlanga is working well because of the good relationship between government and business, which is what has also made Cape Town successful. Government cannot make cities thrive on its own. Those private owners who abandon their buildings when they get old, after raking in all the money, contribute immensely to the deterioration of a city. The same thing happened in New York, before Donald Trump and others took a gamble to improve New York.

[@SoulBuddy2222]

By the way, I decided to ignore your racism, because I will never allow myself to stoop to that low level. However, you can easily meet your match in Julius Malema and others.

[@TickleThatFancy]

😂 the "real" flag you say 😂😂😂😂😂😂😂😂😂

[@blakshatta4093]

These people from cold room countries

[@malasookraj1928]

What happn to Durban now. SAD

[@gerhardkruger7157]

Yes, it may be a what.

[@Kbyr083]

So many tedious comments.

[@cherylmay1956]

and then ANC happened

[@ADIOLIQUID]

From Swamp to City to a Shithole!

[@Henry-md8ku]

It was a beautiful and fun place to visit but now it is disgusting

[@gysgijsbers4202]

It's easier to build a flourishing city & country with an endless supply of willing, hardworking, cheap labour. The problem comes when that labour force is the MAJORITY & DEMOCRACY will give them the keys to GOVERNMENT, which is what happened in 1994. The British or Western Culture does not mean much to the MAJORITY.

[@Fr333man]

Humble beginnings 😂😂😂 did you see the masonry buildings, electric trams and government structures while we where still living in wooden shakes and supposedly traveling by ox and wagon 1880

[@norahappolus8994]

Where are our glorious African warriors and leaders depicted.?

[@liongod1000]

*_ They didn't contribute anything in those days... sitting around in the 'Homelands'having Indaba after Indaba with lots of "African Beer" _* 😅🤣😂

[@WendyTrent-y8w]

They built nothing, so why do they need to be represented?

[@alansutherland7680]

Victorian apartheid had to fall now Durban needs a name change.

[@EllamaJimmy]

This is the fragmented society we live in South Africa is being capitalized by foreigners from Janus Walus to The Guptas to The Nigerian drug dealers !!!!!

[@liongod1000]

*_ How about "SWAMP-TINI" _*

[@ericacutten5593]

@@alansutherland7680 did you know that apartheid started in Durban....group areas act to keep Indians out of the upper Berea?

[@khulekaninyuswa721]

Wow they were really trying to turn Durban into their own country these people

[@pevenmadilaneysmitt8462]

Now that you people took it over it's the worst province in South Africa

[@khulekaninyuswa721]

@pevenmadilaneysmitt8462 If you don't like it, you more than welcome to leave us

[@Anti-Woke310]

So it all worked out in the end, it’s no longer ‘like their own country’

[@SoulBuddy2222]

​@@pevenmadilaneysmitt8462It's the 2nd and sometimes 3rd economic contributor in the country.

[@imranzikhali4156]

Cute but remember that Durban is in africa and africa always had people who's land was confiscated

[@imranzikhali4156]

@David_ZAR yep u are right on that one, I'm no anc supporter and I agree that the anc looted everything

[@Gerrardboss-v2g]

Yah and the Bantu were first to confiscate the land from the KHOI-SAN . In Natal the Bantu zulu invaded colonized and committed genocde against the original inhabitants the KHOI-SAN . So let's keep things in perspective .

[@longbuggyride]

@@imranzikhali4156 not cute. Absolutely amazing what people with pride and knowhow can achieve. Now there is no pride nor dignity in that cesspool of trash and crime. So sad. But like you said this is Africa.

[@lionelsquires7662]

​@@Gerrardboss-v2gspot on. Mfecane did just that as well!!!

[@amilesangweni3823]

​@@Gerrardboss-v2g you like rewriting history. Funny how most African can speak languages with clicks then the so called European. But the again Europe will soon be a Islamic nations

[@Pipebenda-ZA]

1994..... From City to Septic swamp!

[@EllamaJimmy]

This is Revelation in the making,thus sayeth The Lord of all Creations!! But people's minds are toxic so this is what people do to object to democracy laid out in 1994!!

[@Wolf24150]

They should make s documentary on what the ANC didnt destroy

[@pierrefourie1786]

Impossible, what haven't they yet destroyed?

[@g.mgomza239]

It was a city only for the minority foreigner native peoples need to build their own without foreign interference

[@xenswim1]

Today a slum in most of the city center, . Point roas name changed but all it did was degrase even more to a drug den. The namr of Mahatma gundi road is an insult to indians as it stands today

[@caseykuhn4041]

😂😂😂 lol no wonder it's so hot and moist