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Perception Of Urban Beautification Program
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Urban beautification refers to a program that protects and seeks to
restore the beaty inherent in a targeted environment, in this case of
urban centre. Most developing countries in the world engage in urban
beautification of cities whose state has deteriorated or decayed, in
order to enhance the quality of the environment and for the purpose of
bringing out nature’s beauty. There are various forms of urban
beautification, among which are creation of car parks, the provision of
proper refuse dump for dirt in order to avoid littering, construction of
bridges to enhance transportation, construction of walkways, sculpture
decoration, ornamentation and greening of the environment and many more.
The underlying purpose of carrying out these projects are to give a
facelift to parts of the cities, that is, development and to make the
immediate environment attractive for investors, among others (Bilgili BC
and Gokyer E 2012).
In the case of Nigeria, the Action Congress of
Nigeria (ACN), that was ruling some state of the federation then before
changing to All Progressive Congress (APC) in the last general election
of 2015, was carrying out beautification projects as part of its
political agenda. This is to bring about a face lift to the states they
govern, in terms of planting greens (flowers, trees) and expanding old
major roads to enhance movement in the respective states and the
country.
Therefore, these two forms of urban beautification are of
paramount importance to the present study on Ibadan urban. However, just
a few portion of the state capital was covered.
In the case of
Ibadan region, that is, the pattern of urban beautification differs in
the entire metropolis. Places like Eleyele, Onireke, Aleshiloye, Gate,
uch, Mokola, Challenge are more of road expansion project, then,
Ring-Road, Gate, Dugbe, Bodija, Toll Gate and Akinyemi that features the
planting of greens.
Whatever the case, before any form of
beautification could be implemented, certain structures would have been
demolished. Consequently, social and economic activitives would have
been impacted negatively among others. Therefore, containers, kiosks or
any other structure that are built in open spaces close to the road were
subject to demolition. In Ibadan urban, more than 400 structures,
including residential buildings that encroached on roads and illegal
structures built by dwellers and traders were demolished in designated
commercial parts of the city.The presence study is therefore to verify
the perception of Ibadan metropolis dwellers on urban beautification
programmes in Ibadan metropolis.
1.5STATEMENT OF PROBLEM
There are
many problems facing most urban centers, among which are the growth of
illegal unauthorized structures; that is structures that flout principle
of the standard offset backs to roads, high tension power-lines and
unauthorized conversion of approved use of land to different use(s)
that’s encroached on open spaces. These are compounded by growing
population size and increase of social and economic activities. Ibadan
metropolis, as a commercial nerve center of Nigeria and as an area
experiencing high rate of urbanization is lacking in terms of adequate
physical
layout adnd planning. In the recent past, Ibadan was classified as one
of the dirtiest cities in the world, due to the shabby environmental
situation of the largest city, south of the Sahara. (Kumuyi 2005).
However,
Oyo state Government took interest in urban beautification in order to
transform the city into a better shape. This resulted in the demolition
of illegal structures along selected road. The spilt-over effect is the
displacement of traders that occupied the illegal shops and spaces along
the roads. The present study is therefore to examine the forms of urban
beautification that are implemented in Ibadan urban and the way the
dwellers perceived it. These are examined in terms of changes in the
rate of security, road accessibility, loss of buildings/shops, damaged
acquired by individuals to the city.
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