Talk:Johannesburg

Hi I was shocked to see the prices of accommodation......it has sky rocketed in the whole of SA since my last visit. This time around I am looking to house sit in and around Randburg for the last two weeks in January. I love SA having lived there for 6 years but now living in Canada I find that the Rand to dollar ratio, especially now that I am in early retirement, too expensive to afford the hotel and B & B rates being charged. Anyone know of a reasonable priced place in the Randburg area welcome to contact me. marlenna@quickclic.net

It it's your thing you might want to look at couchsurfing as well http://www.couchsurfing.com (WT-en) Bain 02:09, 5 January 2011 (EST)

"Oprah herself has said..." Apparently no irony here. Dear God, have we sunk so far?

Quite right! Property prices in general have been rising at a rapid clip - I believe 300% over the last years. The B&B prices will be best....try find a reasonably priced one through the AA travel website http://www.aatravel.co.za

"The contrast between rich and poor has led to one of the highest crime rates in the world." This is BS - not NPOV at all. Let's face it. If the rich all left and everyone were evenly poor, the crime rate wouldn't go down at all.

Districts

discussion of Nov 12 moved from User talk:(WT-en) NJR ZA (WT-en) WindHorse 11:16, 12 November 2006 (EST)

Hi Nick, I started a district section on the Jo'burg page, and have listed Soweto under Region six. However, I'm not sure that these politically designated districts are the best way to divide up the city in terms of providing info for visitors. So, please feel free to change as you feel appropriate. Thanks. WindHorse 10:51, 12 November 2006 (EST)

I also don't think the administrative regions are the best way to divide the city from a traveler's point of view. I think Soweto deserves a page of it's own as it is very big and cultural tourism is growing in that area. It might be better to break it up into six: Central, Northern and Southern Johannesburg, West Rand, East Rand and Soweto. Let's leave it as you have broken it up for now, but also leave the option open to change it later. Maybe add an entry on the discussion page for people to comment of how they would like to see it broken up - Nick Roux 11:02, 12 November 2006 (EST)

Stay safe

After reading the "stay safe" section, why would anyone want to visit Johannesburg? Unless one wants to live in total fear and mistrust when they visit. It makes it sound like eventualy you will be "jacked up" so dont be a hero and carry on.

It is considered one of the more dangerous cities in the world, no? Do you think we shouldn't warn of those things just to make it sound more appealing to tourists? Nobodies saying that those things will happen to you if you go there, but they are things to take into consideration. Most guidebooks have similar warnings. If you're really familiar with the city and disagree, you're as free as anyone to edit the article and make it better reflect reality. I spent a week there and was fine. But I can't say that it felt like an overly safe city either. – (WT-en) cacahuate ^talk 01:42, 5 April 2007 (EDT)

I live in the area and the entry seems to be accurate enough. Johannesburg is for the most part a first world city with excellent infrastructure (except public transport infrastructure, there we fall very short), but violent crime is a very serious problem. In general, the DO NOT TRY TO BE A HERO! bit is something that I don't agree with it for two reasons. Firstly because many people have simply handed over whatever was demanded of them just to end up dead anyway, secondly because I believe that it further increases crime as it decreases the risk to the criminal and makes committing the crimes a lot easier. (The same reason why the USA has a firm policy not to negotiate with kidnappers). This is however a travel wiki and not a political forum. Not being a hero probably is good advice for travelers. --(WT-en) NJR_ZA 09:16, 5 April 2007 (EDT)

Can someone explain what is a "red robot"? [QUOTE]At night do not stop at red robots.[/QUOTE]

Do you mean at red traffic lights? Pardon my ignorance.

I quite agree with the stay safe entery about DO NOT TRY TO BE A HERO. Not handing your stuff over makes it alot more likely that you get hurt. Also maybe the Red Robot should be changed. Most people don't call Traffic Lights Robots. I only figured that out on a recent visit to Joburg. 70.56.91.182 23:18, 16 December 2007 (EST)

Everyone in Joburg calls traffic lights ROBOTS. If you heard them being called "traffic lights", it's because people identified you as an out-of-towner and were politely trying not to confuse you. The advice not to stop at red robots is wrong and misleading. They're red robots for a reason, and to disobey them is to invite danger and chaos. Just keep your eyes open and drive with care, as you would in any big city.

Lion drops in for take-aways

Good reason why one should keep windows closed when visiting the Lion Park. News24-Lion drops in for take-aways

Restructure

I am busy restructuring Gauteng to give it a formal hierarchy, a resturcure of Johannesburg will happen at the same time. Some of the content currently in the Johannesburg article will be moved out of Johannesburg and into the correct Gauteng region where it belongs. --(WT-en) NJR_ZA 15:38, 8 October 2007 (EDT)

Santarama Miniland

The following entry has been removed from the guide and should probably be kept out.

• <see name="Santarama Miniland" alt="" address="183 Rosettenville Rd, Pioneer Park" directions="" phone="+27 (0)11 435-0543" email="" fax="(+27 (0)11 435-9905" url="" hours="Open 9AM to 5PM daily" price="">Johannesburg in miniature. </see>

Reason for removal

Though many guide books and web sites still list Santarama, it really is not much of an attraction anymore. The miniature models are in a serious state of disrepair, none of the animatronics are functioning, there is no water flowing over the Howick falls and the dam is dry and full of trash. A real shame as it used to be a lovely place to visit.

--(WT-en) Nick 13:52, 9 August 2008 (EDT)

MetroRail safety?

The "Get in" section describes "most" MetroRail trains as "quite safe", but Stay safe goes on to say that "Public transport use is discouraged as frequent attacks occur on the crowded services." Which is the case? If some lines are safe, and others aren't, then please say which is which! (WT-en) Jpatokal 03:42, 22 September 2008 (EDT)

Districtify

Maybe an option divide Joburg in Central, North, South, East and West, similar to this wikipedia picture [1]. Soweto would go into SouthWest and Sandton would fit in the North(ern suburbs). Or even split in only 3 sections: Central, North and South, because there's pretty much no info about the southeast. —The preceding comment was added by (WT-en) Babbelas (talk • contribs)

I agree with this - a good split would be Central, Northern suburbs, Soweto - the current split is too disaggregated (inc Randburg and Roodepoort). How do we change 'Sandton' in to 'Northern suburbs'? —The preceding comment was added by (WT-en) Hongu (talk • contribs)

OK, what's going on with the districts? We have a bunch of "movetodistrict" tags, but most of the districts are not linked. Ikan Kekek (talk) 20:46, 25 January 2016 (UTC)

As there does not seem to have been any work on the districts since 2016, I plunged forward and created an Inner City district page. --Jonte-- (talk) 14:24, 7 October 2018 (UTC)

2020

Johannesburg has been halfway districtified for as long as I can remember, and this is both confusing for readers and embarrassing for us who are trying to provide readers good and useful travel guides.

I'm completely unfamiliar with this part of the world, but maybe the above discussions can provide some smart suggestions for districts. Another tactic would be dividing the city into a couple of districts along borders that are easily visible both on a map and in real life (bodies of water, railways, major roads and so on). Nevertheless, the first thing would be adding the coordinates for the listings in the main Johannesburg article and see where they end up on the map so as not to create articles with no or almost no listings at all. Ypsilon (talk) 17:02, 18 January 2020 (UTC)

Two+ years later and the situation is still the same. Anyone familiar with Johannesburg? Ypsilon (talk) 13:26, 10 April 2022 (UTC)

Nu? It would be great for someone who knows the city to clean this up. Ikan Kekek (talk) 09:08, 20 May 2022 (UTC)

Anyone? --Ypsilon (talk) 17:14, 29 July 2024 (UTC)

Soweto

The first paragraph of the "Do" section warns visitors to only go to Soweto with an official tour operator and to never go there on their own. But the paragraph immediately above that at the end of the "See" section encourages people to drive into Soweto on their own and mingle with the locals. One or the other of these recommendations probably ought to be removed. —The preceding comment was added by Koreth~enwikivoyage (talk • contribs)

Districts, 2024

I'm working on cleaning up this article, but I don't know the city. Should Rosebank listings be moved to Inner City or to Sandton? Ground Zero (talk) 14:21, 15 December 2024 (UTC)

I've moved them to Sandton, which really covers all of Johannesburg north of the Inner City. Someone who knows Joburg may want to split the Sandton article up, or rename it to reflect this. Ground Zero (talk) 23:53, 15 December 2024 (UTC)

Thanks for doing this, GZ! I don't know Johannesburg either but as you can see in my comments above, I've found it annoying that the article has been halfway districtified possibly since the project was known as Wikitravel.

One way to resolve this would be to add coordinates for everything using Google Maps or some similar service and then divide the city after landmarks that are both visible on a map and presumably also on the ground (large boulevards, bodies of water, railways etc.). --Ypsilon (talk) 19:53, 17 December 2024 (UTC)

As you will see, I have already started this, and cleared out the Buy, Eat, Drink and Sleep listing. I am working on See and Do, but that will take more effort. I am moving listings to the four existing districts (and some that are not in Jo'burg to outlying regions). If someone wants to subdivide Sandton or other districts when I am done, they are welcome to do so. Ground Zero (talk) 21:23, 17 December 2024 (UTC)