Dakar

Dakar occupies the Cap-Vert peninsula, where its coastal setting has constrained metropolitan expansion. Government and commercial activities concentrated in the Plateau, while port-related industry extended around the bay along railway and road corridors. The city’s growth subsequently spread inland through successive planned neighbourhoods and settlements developed outside formal planning.

This urban structure reflects both colonial residential separation and later migration. The creation of the Médina in 1914 and the development of Grand Dakar and Pikine accompanied the relocation of residents away from the centre. The resulting distance between peripheral housing and concentrated services remains a central planning issue, alongside drainage and flood management in low-lying districts.