Introduction

1Boundaries are not merely lines of demarcation but socio-spatial institutions that shape human territoriality, everyday life, power relations, access, and mobility (Newman, 2006; Kolossov & Scott, 2013; Mezzadra & Neilson, 2013; Cresswell, 2014). Gaeta (2020) challenges the traditional view of boundaries as static barriers or material obstacles that hinder movement, arguing that boundaries are most effective when they align with people's daily movements. These daily movements of people and goods create a functional area rather than defined lines, creating linkages that extend beyond borders. According to Rumford (2010) and Cresswell (2014), borders are dynamic, and are continually shaped by the movement of people and goods in the era of globalisation. Border areas, including the peri-urban zone discussed in this paper, are places in transition that are constantly changing, beyond the static boundary lines. In addition, peri-urban spaces are embedded with layered territorial histories, governance overlaps, and functional linkages (Agergaard et al., 2018; Chirisa et al., 2016) that continue to regulate land ownership, infrastructure provision, and social stratification. This paper explores the intersections of peri-urban and post-colonial spatial transformation in an area defined by the historical Raini boundary, which demarcated settler-owned coffee plantations from smallholder farms. It explores the tension between mobility and territorial fixity of this area’s peri-urban transformation.

2Colonial boundaries were created to meet the administrative requirements and priorities of imperial powers rather than local realities (Button, 2019). Colonial boundaries served as barriers of movement and tools for racial and social segregation that persisted into the post-colonial era (Hughes, 2011; Silva, 2019). Administrative and colonial boundaries were often arbitrary and non-natural, structures that continue to shape the political, economic, and social landscapes of post-independence nations (Button, 2019; Kennedy, 2017). Post-independent cities did not correct this anomaly, and the new urban structures in colonial cities often copied the colonial form, creating rigid hierarchies between zones occupied by elites and those occupied by the lower classes (Silva, 2019).

3Urban and rural areas are viewed by policy actors as dichotomous, with delineated boundaries separating them as two distinct areas under separate governance jurisdictions, often ignoring the gradient between the two especially at the peri-urban zones (Simon et al., 2004; Adam & Dadi, 2023). Researchers, and development partners have advocated for an approach that integrates the two areas and views them as a continuum rather than a dichotomy (Sietchiping, Kago, Zhang, Tuts, et al., 2014). Traditional approaches to the development of urban and rural areas tended to focus on either one or the other, not on how the two function together. This was a result of sectoral approaches to development in both urban and rural areas evidenced by the definition of urban and rural areas as distinct geographical zones (Sietchiping, Kago, Zhang, Augustinus, et al., 2014). It also arises from the conceptualisation by decision makers, development workers and certain scholarly literature of separate sectoral functions in both urban and rural areas, which see rural areas as agricultural, raw material-oriented and urban areas as production and retail-oriented. FAO (2011, p. 16) describes this false dichotomy as “artificial and counter-productive.” According to Tacoli (2003, p. 3), “the notion of a 'divide’ has become a misleading metaphor, one that oversimplifies and even distorts the realities.”

4According to the OECD (2013, p. 3), "the traditional distinction between urban and rural areas is increasingly blurred." It is thus inappropriate to divide the two regions along hypothetically hazy boundaries between urban and rural areas. Within the framework of functional regions that extend beyond the administrative boundaries of urban and rural areas, there are interconnections and interactions between the two areas in the form of urban-rural linkages. Urban areas exhibit rural traits, and rural areas exhibit urban characteristics; boundaries have become indiscernible and hard to delineate (Chirisa et al., 2014; Ndabeni, 2017; OECD, 2013). Some urban areas such as informal settlements exhibit rural characteristics, with mud-walled houses that are common in rural areas. Urban residents also engage in predominantly rural activities, such as agriculture, especially in peri-urban areas.

5The significance of territorial interconnectivity in peri-urban areas transcends administrative borders, hence the need to understand the interactions, integration, and cooperation between regions, and the challenges of this territorial interconnectivity. The integration of functions between urban and rural areas is vital for cohesive regional development. Peri-urban boundaries represent the frontier of urban expansion, where urban and rural land uses intersect creating broader restructuring of rural livelihoods. Agergaard et al. (2018) argue that rural–urban change should not be understood as a simple spatial urban encroachment from agriculture to urban land use, but as a reconfiguration of economic functions, labour regimes, and territorial relations across small towns and metropolitan hinterlands. Peri-urban zones are not residual spaces awaiting urban expansion but instead are sites of negotiated transformation where agrarian production, wage labour, mobility, and speculative land markets intersect.

6There is limited literature on how inherited colonial land demarcations structure these peri-urban expansion processes. Understanding the evolution of these boundaries is critical for managing urban sprawl, ensuring sustainable land use, and mitigating environmental impacts. The research sought to answer the following research questions: What are the socio-political dynamics of the evolution of the City of Nairobi’s peri-urban area from the colonial period to date, and the socio-economic consequences of this uneven territorial urbanisation?

Methodology and theoretical perspective

7In the paper, we present the results of research that used qualitative techniques to study the evolution of the boundary between Ruiru and Githunguri sub-counties, in Kiambu County, Kenya, from the colonial period to date, and the tensions that have existed between these two areas. The study took place between December 2017 and December 2021 as part of a PhD research on “Mobility patterns and their impact on urban-rural linkages in small and intermediate towns in Kenya: A focus on the milk value chain.” It used ethnographic methods, including participatory observation and interviews with actors, while accompanying them in their daily routines. The study also entailed a virtual observation of the transect using Google Street View (GSV) images (Kago, 2024). The transect was selected because of its proximity to the city of Nairobi, and the dynamic urban-rural linkages resulting from a vibrant dairy value chain. 57 respondents were interviewed, including farmers, milk vendors, transporters, and other actors in the dairy value chain. All names used are pseudonyms. The research focused on a specific transect along the Githunguri – Uplands road. Geographers and planners have used transects as a visual tool to undertake spatial analysis, especially in comparing variations of geographical conditions along them, such as climatic, land use, ecological and topographical conditions. Andres Duany applied the transect to illustrate the rural-to-urban gradation between a natural zone, rural zone, sub-urban zone, general urban zone, urban centre zone, and urban core zone, highlighting that there is a differentiated continuum from rural to urban settlements (Bohl & Plater-Zyberk, 2006). The 20-kilometre transect we studied in Kiambu County spans the two sub-counties of Githunguri and Ruiru. The proximity to Nairobi presents both opportunities and structural vulnerabilities within the metropolitan functional system. The climatic conditions also vary gradually along the transect from cool to warm climates. The topography varies from steep V-shaped valleys in Ngewa to gentle valleys and plains found in the lowlands of Ruiru. There is a range of landholdings from small parcels (0.045 hectares) to large parcels (over 500 hectares), separated by a visible Raini boundary between the smallholder farms and the large coffee plantations at the boundary of Githunguri and Ruiru sub-counties. This boundary has its origins in the colonial era, when the colonialists owned the large coffee plantations, and the native Kikuyu population lived in colonial villages that are now smallholder farms.

8The paper is anchored in the concept of rural-urban continuum. The concept highlights the interconnectedness of urban and rural areas instead of viewing them as separate spatial entities. Urban and rural populations may appear geographically distinct, but in an era of globalisation and digitization, these spaces are becoming more interconnected through flows of people, goods, and services. Rural communities now have access to some of the social amenities once found only in urban areas, such as electricity, mobile phones, television and radio sets. Furthermore, a functional network of linkages connects urban and rural communities, sustaining the exchanges between them, forming a dynamic system rather than a rigid spatial divide. A summary of the links between urban and rural areas is shown in Figure 1 below.

9This paper also uses political economy as a critical framework for describing how the power relations and legacies of the past shape the socio-spatial organization of Nairobi's peri-urban transformation and its hinterland. Within the growing metropolitan periphery of Nairobi, the approach applies to the examination of how both colonial land grants and elite capture by post-independence elites still control access to space, resources, and infrastructure. The transformation of large coffee estates into exclusive developments illustrates processes of uneven development and exclusion.

10The first section of the paper covers the introduction, methodology and theoretical perspectives. The second section covers the research findings, focusing on the evolution of land-use at the peri-urban boundary between Ruiru and Githunguri sub-counties, the decline of the coffee sector, everyday mobility along the transect, and the dilemma of the expanding city. The last section is the conclusion and recommendations. The paper argues that urban expansion in Nairobi’s periphery is shaped not only by peri-urbanisation, but also by colonial land demarcation, post-independence land politics, elite capture, and infrastructure-led developments. The Raini boundary thus operates as both a historical artefact, and as an active socio-spatial regulator of opportunity, access, and exclusion in this peri-urban zone.

Research Findings

Evolutions of the colonial boundary

11Prior to land alienation during the creation of the British colony in Kenya in 1895, the Kikuyu community resided in scattered small villages on the slopes of Mount Kenya and the Aberdare mountain range. During the colonial period, the fertile plains in the then Kiambu District, including the area between Ruiru and Ngewa, were forcefully acquired by the British administration for the cultivation of large scale coffee plantations (Overton, 1988; Wamagatta, 2009). The Kikuyu community was restricted to native villages, separated by the colonial plantations with a clear Raini boundary. Ndirangu (2016) points out that these villages were akin to detention and concentration camps aimed at controlling the Mau Mau rebellion. Each village had about 2,000 to 3,000 people settled in plots of about 80 by 100 feet (Ndirangu, 2016).

12Coffee production is labour intensive, and the colonial government exploited the surrounding local populations for cheap and forced labour. The introduction of a hut tax in 1901 created a flow of labourers from the colonial villages to the large coffee plantations as the local native population sought employment to facilitate its payment (Fibaek, 2020; Ndirangu, 2016; Tarus, 2004). During the colonial period, the locals were not allowed to grow coffee in the colonial villages until after the Mau Mau war between 1952 and 1960. Forced labour and land alienation were some of the major factors that triggered the Mau Mau revolution, which among other events and factors, led to Kenya’s independence in 1963 (Ndirangu, 2016).

13Just before independence, in 1962, the colonial government sourced funds through the World Bank in the form of grants and loans to purchase land from the European settlers - the One-Million-Acre Scheme as a strategy to safeguard the European landowners willing to sell off their land and settle the landless Kenyans. However, the implementation of the land resettlement scheme was characterised by nepotism and favouritism (Khamisi, 2018). After independence, the local community continued practicing small-scale coffee farming in the farms where they were resettled, while the majority of the large coffee farms were bought by politically connected individuals (Fibaek, 2020; Khamisi, 2018; Ndege, 2000). It is estimated that only 20 per cent of the large-scale firms were subdivided in the initial phase of resettlement after independence (Ndege, 2000). The new class of wealthy landowners at the time included members of the Kenyan elite who held leadership roles, such as legislators, senior government employees and merchants (El-Ghonemy, 2006; Khamisi, 2018).

14In Kiambu, land ownership became polarised as, on one hand, there were a few community-owned farms like Mbo-I-Kamiti and Lioki Coffee Estate, where the local community collectively raised money to buy the land from the colonizers after independence. On the other hand, the large coffee plantations were acquired by the African elites. This included Socfinaf Company Limited, which acquired Tatu and Mchana, two significant coffee estates between Ngewa and Ruiru, that are currently becoming the location of a mega infrastructural development, named Tatu City - a Special Economic Zone that is transforming the area to residential, commercial, and industrial developments as part of Kenya’s Vision 2030.

15After independence, the main interaction between the local population and the large coffee plantations was the provision of unskilled employment. Although this type of employment was not considered forced labour after independence, it was nevertheless exploitative (Fibaek, 2020). During the coffee-picking season, the workers would be transported from the surrounding areas to the large coffee plantations in lorries, a phenomenon that we observed during the fieldwork (see Figure 2). Fibaek (2020) in a study of unskilled labour in large-scale farm employment in Kenya notes that “employment on large farms by itself cannot lead to general poverty reduction,” and that unskilled labour is barely able to sustain people’s lives. The author notes that workers who need to sustain larger households are not able to meet their daily needs and indicates that this kind of unskilled labour can even lead to intergenerational poverty: “both the parents and children of the worker had been employed on large farms, revealing an intergenerational pattern of farm employment and poverty” (Fibaek, 2020, p. 56). In fact, the author noted that these workers are not able to educate their children beyond primary education.

16The current post-independence low-wage labour movements across the Raini boundary demonstrates unequal labour relations that failed to generate upward mobility, thereby institutionalizing intergenerational poverty. This labour regime established a socio-spatial hierarchy in which surrounding African communities remained economically dependent yet structurally marginalized from land ownership and capital accumulation in the large coffee plantations.

Decline of the coffee sector and transition to real estate development

17The decline in coffee production has been a key factor in the socio-spatial transformation of both large and small-scale farmers. The sector's downturn is attributed to the collapse of the International Coffee Agreement on 4th July 1989, which created competitive international markets. Poor administration of cooperative organizations, high production costs with low returns, late payments to farmers, climate change, and restrictive legislation were also issues that contributed to the sector's downfall (Ndirangu, 2016). After tourism, tea, and horticulture, coffee was rated fourth in terms of the Kenyan earnings (Mwangi, 2014). As a result, some coffee estates have had their coffee bushes chopped as they slowly turn into real estate developments. This has caused grass and weeds to thrive. The cultivation of napier grass and maize is evident in former coffee growing areas along the transect (see Figure 3). Mbo-I-Kamiti, a community-owned group ranch with over 11,000 acres in Riabai, along the Ngewa to Kiambu road, is no longer growing coffee. The company collapsed due to low returns from coffee sales, debts, leadership wrangles and mismanagement (Weru et al., 2011). The land has been sub-divided, and some of the owners are leasing it out for the planting of maize and napier grass, while others are constructing single dwelling units. After harvesting, the maize stalks are sold to the dairy farmers.

18The flat topography at the lower part of the transect, the close proximity of the area to Nairobi and the presence of Ruiru town, a favourable dormitory town for Nairobi’s workers, with good access to the city centre through Thika road, make Ruiru a favourable location for real estate development. As a result of the changing land use, Socfinaf Company Limited’s Tatu and Mchana coffee estates are currently transforming into Tatu City, a new town development which extends to the Raini boundary between Ruiru and Githunguri sub-counties. The New Town is characterized by real estate and industrial development. It is a flagship project of Kenya’s Vision 2030, designated as a Special Economic Zone by the Kenyan government and benefiting from tax advantages to boost export related industrial investments (Bartke et al., 2021; Maina & Cirolia, 2023; Splinter & Van Leynseele, 2019). Approximately 1850.77 hectares (4,571 acres) of Tatu City development, owned and developed by Rendeavour Group, is covered by phases one (965.66 Hectares), which is already under development and phase two (885.22 Hectares), which covers Mchana Estate, that is still currently under coffee plantations (Kibwage, 2019). The new town is set up as an exclusive area with security controls at all entrances (see Figure 4), contractor code and guidelines, and strict traffic and speed limit controls. The new town has its own transport vans and does not allow the commonly used public transport – matatus (privately owned transport vans).

19Despite the formal end of colonial rule, the legacy of the Raini boundary continues to shape spatial inequalities. The large estates, while under nominal private ownership, continue to act as barriers to equitable urban integration. The controlled access, exclusion of informal transport (matatus), and internal governance mechanisms reveal the emergence of privatized urbanism that spatially segregates new investment zones from surrounding settlements. Meanwhile, smallholders on the other side of the Raini boundary engage in adaptive agriculture, often reliant on informal leasing, communal labour, and constrained mobility.

20This structural divide is compounded by land speculation and urban real estate pressures, as elites and private developers transform former agricultural land into gated communities, industrial parks, and commercial zones. The decline of the coffee sector initiated a process of agrarian restructuring in which land was progressively detached from its primary agricultural function to a financial and speculative asset. As agricultural profitability declined and metropolitan land values rose, land use shifted to the more profitable real estate investment. The Raini boundary therefore operates not only as a historical demarcation, but as a spatial hinge through which global coffee commodity crises and metropolitan land speculation converge, restructuring agrarian landscapes and livelihoods into real estate urban frontiers. The proximity to infrastructure corridors, Vision 2030 flagship projects, and Special Economic Zone incentives accelerated this shift, transforming coffee estates into urban use (Gillespie & Mwau, 2024). This case exemplifies how postcolonial land hierarchies are reconfigured through the state-backed Kenya Vision 2030 New City flagship project, reinforcing uneven territorial integration rather than inclusive metropolitan regeneration.

21The study shows that the peri-urban transformation of former coffee estates into elite real estate enclaves did not alter the unequal relationship between large coffee estate landholding and neighbouring smallholder farming communities. This uneven transformation dictates who has access to infrastructure, who can accumulate land-based wealth, and who remains vulnerable to displacement. The Raini boundary, originally established to separate settler-owned estates from African smallholder reserves, continues to function as a material and symbolic frontier that shapes contemporary land markets, planning regimes, and socio-economic opportunities. By tracing this boundary historically and spatially, the study highlights how territorial governance continues to shape contemporary peri-urbanization. As noted by Di Matteo (2021), these changes are not adequately captured by classical centre-periphery theories but suggest a hybrid geography of elite-led urban expansion.

Everyday mobility across the boundary

22A key form of interaction between the smallholder farmers and the large coffee plantations observed during fieldwork was the movement of the smallholder farmers in search for fodder for their dairy animals in patches of grasslands in the large coffee plantations within Tatu City. There are sections of land within the coffee plantations that are unsuitable for coffee production due to inadequate drainage or the condition of the soil. These areas are left as grasslands, and the smallholder farmers rely on them to cut grass for their cattle (See Figure 5). However, these areas are transforming into real estate and industrial developments as discussed in the next section (see Figure 6). In fact, because of the coffee industry's downfall, some of the vast coffee estates experience neglect, leading to the growth of bushes and grass that the farmers use. Depending on the size of their vehicles or modes of transport, farmers cutting grass in Tatu City pay an entrance charge to access the grasslands. The farmers commute using a variety of vehicles, including canters, pickups, scooters, bicycles, and donkey-drawn carts.

23Cutting and selling grass has been a business venture for communities living near the large coffee plantations. The traders cut the grass at the plantations and transport it to the farmers located near Kwamaiko/ Ngewa market centre adjacent to the Raini boundary. A bicycle loaded with cut grass is sold at Ksh. 350 while a motorbike delivers grass at Ksh. 500-600 per trip, depending on the season. Bicycle traders can make two trips in a day, while motorbike traders can make three trips in a day. Bicycles, motorbikes, and donkey-pulled carts were observed ferrying grass between Ruiru and Kwamaiko during fieldwork. Additionally, with Google Street View (GSV), we were able to observe notable activities involving the cutting, displaying, transportation and selling of grass along Kigumo road that runs parallel to the Ruiru to Uplands transect (Kago, 2024) (see Figure 7 and 8).

24There is also a flow of casual workers in and out of Tatu City to the neighbouring low-income neighbourhoods. Despite the “Live, Work, and Play” branding, housing affordability thresholds exclude the very labour force that sustains the new town’s industrial economy. The labourers reside in neighbourhoods like BTL and Ngewa. The latter is adjacent to the Raini boundary. A worker at one of the companies in Tatu City, which employs about 1,000 people, indicated that casual labourers are paid about Ksh. 15,000 per month as entry-level salaries and would not afford to stay within Tatu City. He resides in Ngewa and commutes daily to the factory. Monthly rent for a residential unit in the new town starts at Ksh. 40,000. At the junction of Ngenda road and Ruiru - Githunguri road, in Tatu City where two large industries are located, there were groups of workers waiting for public transport, and some requesting lifts from motorists plying the route in the evening hours after work, reflecting income insecurity. The increasing demand for low-income housing units around Tatu City is likely to accelerate the conversion of agricultural land into real estate.

25Tatu City’s model of privatized, master-planned urban development reproduces socio-spatial segregation rather than fostering inclusive regeneration. This generates a functional but unequal spatial pattern, in which low-wage workers reside in adjacent, lower-income settlements across the former colonial divide and commute daily into an enclave of higher land values and better infrastructure. The daily circulation of labour across the Raini boundary reveals that the boundary continues to structure differential access to urban opportunity, housing, and services. Rather than erasing the colonial-era spatial hierarchies, the real estate transformation appears to reconfigure them within a neoliberal urban framework, producing a dual metropolitan landscape where capital accumulation and labour reproduction are spatially separated. The transformation reveals that the real estate transformation reconfigures its exclusionary nature from low-wage agrarian labour dependency discussed in the previous section to low-wage urban labour. This reinforces the paper’s thesis that colonial territorial structures persist within the contemporary peri-urban transformation process.

Dilemma of an expanding city

26The expansion of Nairobi metropolitan area into the adjoining rural areas is leading to a structural displacement of agrarian economies by speculative capital (Gillespie & Mwau, 2024), exposing the vulnerability of the smallholder farming communities. Ruiru town is already expanding into the rich agricultural land. Tatu City is being developed on land previously used for coffee farming. Ruiru sub-county also hosts Northlands City, which will cover 11,576 acres of land previously used for ranching. This expansion of the town into rural areas, driven by the demand for housing, is ‘eating’ into the rural agricultural activities, threatening food security and natural ecosystems (Bartke et al., 2021):

The rural fringes of urban agglomerations are the cities of tomorrow. Given the rapid pace of horizontal urban growth and the increasing number of industrial and infrastructural projects mushrooming in these areas, peri-urban zones will be rapidly absorbed by expanding cities (Schlimmer, 2021, p. 8).

27The real-estate transformation of the peri-urban area is affecting the farming activities of the smallholder farmers, who relied on the patches of land in between the coffee plantations to cut grass for their cattle upon payment of a fee, indicating that the grass is diminishing (see Figure 5 and 6). Mr. Nderitu, a 52-year-old farmer and mechanic from Miguta, Githunguri pointed out that:

I used to get grass from Ruiru at the ‘weru’ (rangeland) in the coffee plantations. The grass is reducing. The shambas [plots] have been sold in Tatu City, and the buildings have come up.

28Another respondent, Mr. Maina, who used to source grass in Tatu City, now travels to Mbo-i-Kamiti, which is 13 kilometres away, to buy maize stovers. He indicated that the source of grass in Tatu city was diminishing due to ongoing construction activities. The cost for farmers to enter Tatu City to cut grass has increased due to the developments. Tatu City increased the price from Ksh. 800 in 2019 to Ksh. 1,500 in 2020 for anyone who wanted to cut grass on their farm. This was because the grassy areas between the coffee crops were now being prioritised for prime real estate development rather than being left idle land, as had previously been the case. Mr. Nderitu claimed that because it was expensive to transport the grass from Tatu City, he now opted to purchase hay from vendors who brought it in from other regions of the nation like Nakuru, Narok and Laikipia (See Figure 9). Mr. Njaramba, a 46-year-old grass cutter from Raiyani, Kwamaiko who had been in the business of cutting grass for the previous 17 years, said he was no longer cutting grass from Tatu City and was sourcing the grass from other farms like Oaklands, Waguthu, and Bibirioni (Pavillion estate) that neighbour Tatu City. The informal postcolonial economy of grass and hay cutting within the expansive, semi-abandoned coffee estates like those around Tatu City is also central to peri-urban dairy survival. These survival strategies highlight the layered negotiations that underpin peri-urban livelihoods. Dairy farmers are not merely surviving on the urban fringe; they are actively navigating spatial, infrastructural, and institutional landscapes that shape their access to production and distribution resources. Their mobility is not a luxury, but a necessity. This mobility is constantly being adapted in response to peri-urban transformation, and infrastructure development. This transition illustrates how urban development projects reconfigure the spatial economy, often to the detriment of existing users.

29Rotich et al. (2023) show similar adaptation strategies by the Maasai community as a result of the impact of urban expansion on peri-urban pastoralist communities at the periphery of Nairobi. Through their analysis, they reveal how Maasai pastoralists adapt to the changing peri-urban setting with adjustment measures such as participation in land markets and diversification, and the vulnerable status of poor households towards privatization and land commodification. The findings reveal how land ownership history and economic status influence adaptive capacity and exposure to territorial displacement.

30The uncontrolled expansion of the capital City of Nairobi into the peri-urban zone also poses risks to the environmental, social and economic outcomes. The expansion of Ruiru town towards the rural areas is a manifestation of backwash effects created by an expanding core (Nairobi) that has led to the demand for land for the town’s expansion, ‘eating’ into the rural land towards Ruiru and Githunguri sub-county. If left to market forces without any policy control, the expansion of the City of Nairobi and the surrounding urban centres would lead to the growth of one locality and underdevelopment of another locality, creating a core and periphery effect. In the case of Ruiru town, there exists spread effects in the form of a market for the raw and processed milk from the periphery (rural area) to the core (town) that creates rural-urban linkages within that are not restricted to the administrative boundaries. However, the rate of expansion of Ruiru town and its inclination to Nairobi signifies higher backwash effects as compared to spread effects that are evident from the extraction of land and its conversion to real estate. OECD (2013, p. 25) points out this disparity in the growth of the core and the periphery: “A large urban core has the potential to generate strong positive spill-over effects on its surrounding territory, benefiting the entire functional region. However, it can also generate tensions and competitive relationships with smaller surrounding areas, whose interests may not always be aligned.”

31The expansion of Tatu City symbolizes the ambitions of Nairobi’s urban elite and global investors who are pushing into the rural smallholders’ frontier. Tatu City represents both opportunity and displacement, progress and uncertainty to the smallholder farmers of Kiambu County. The New Town is a market for their produce, while on the other hand, it means diminishing fodder for their livestock. The transformation from coffee plantations to gated estates has deepened the social stratification along the historic Raini boundary. Former large-scale estates like Tatu City, which once employed local labourers in the coffee sector, are now being parcelled out for high-end residential and commercial use. The landscape is shifting from production to consumption, from cultivation to speculation. This conversion is driven by both state policy (notably Vision 2030) and market incentives that prioritize real estate returns over agricultural productivity. The transformation of the Nairobi metropolitan fringe thus reveals a double movement: while capital flows into real estate development, everyday producers and traders are forced into more peripheral, marginal, and informal spaces. It reveals the power dynamics in the peri-urban transition that has its foundations in the colonial era and represented by a political elite in the post-colonial era. It shows who has control in the governance and regulation of the peri-urban transformation process and who the city is for, and who gets left behind.

32The detrimental effects of lack of control of the expansion of the City of Nairobi can be alleviated by the intervention of the international, national, regional and local government through the development of spatial plans, enforcement of development control and delineation of the boundaries of the urban centres to protect the rural areas and rich agricultural land. The delineation of urban centres does not act as a limitation of the rural-urban continuum, but in effect ensures that the synergies between the two spaces exist to the benefit of both areas. It seeks to enhance the continuum such that the urban, peri-urban and rural areas co-exist rather than the urban area consuming the rural landscape. This does not imply that land use and delineation boundaries are static but rather emphasises the need for planned and controlled city extension.

33The tensions because of uncontrolled urban expansion are not unique to Nairobi but reflect a broader East African pattern, where peri-urban expansion driven by real estate and infrastructure development produces fragmented governance and uneven socio-economic outcomes. In Dar es Salaam, peri-urban land is likewise commodified for speculative, residential, and investment purposes, driven by demand from middle- and upper-income groups. Bartke et al. (2021) show that in Dar es Salaam, Tanzania, wealthy and politically connected people, and people with middle-class incomes are eager to invest in land in the city's peri-urban districts. Land is purchased in the peri-urban zones of Dar es Salaam for speculative, habitational, and investment purposes, following a similar pattern to the peri-urban zones of Kampala and Nairobi. In a similar manner to the latter two cities mentioned above, Dar es Salaam also has issues with inadequate land regulation, subdivision, and the conversion of agricultural land to residential and commercial usage. Similar to the situation in Kampala, the indigenous populations selling the property and the speculators buying the land experience a power and knowledge asymmetry that causes the sellers to sell the land for less than the market value, a condition that is fuelled by land brokers.

In peri-urban areas, land is gradually absorbed by cities and agricultural land is subdivided and transformed into residential or commercial plots. As a nexus between urban centers and the rural hinterland, these areas are preferred by investors and developers to implement large-scale agricultural and infrastructure projects, but also industrial parks and Special Economic Zones. The result is a mosaic of land uses confronting subsistence economies with capitalistic and commercial projects (Schlimmer, 2021, p. 3).

34The suburbs of Kampala, Uganda, where this gentrification phenomenon is also occurring, follow a similar trend, where the pattern of urban growth is forcing plot owners, who are primarily engaged in farming activities, to sell up. They are not receiving fair compensation because they are unable to negotiate effectively and, in some cases, they are unaware of the current land prices (Chalin et al., 2015). Bartke et al. (2021) argue that the risks of gentrification listed above have not been considered by urban and land policies, and they suggest hybrid forms of land administration and governance as well as an integrated strategy for territorial planning along the continuum from rural to urban. On a similar note, Schlimmer (2021, p. 8) emphasises that there is need “to plan and anticipate the patterns of spatial urban growth.”

36The development of peri-urban zones faces planning and governance challenges as they are at the nexus of urban and rural areas; they also experience land speculation, limited land documentation, political interference, changing land uses, different land tenure regimes, and various planning jurisdictions. Consequently, neighbouring rural areas have a very limited ability to plan for themselves (Bartke et al., 2021; Schlimmer, 2021; Sietchiping, Kago, Zhang, Augustinus, et al., 2014).

In peri-urban areas, authorities from different administrative levels intervene and their responsibilities sometimes overlap. Customary authorities, decentralized or deconcentrated administrators, municipal decision-makers and central government stakeholders interact and sometimes compete over the legitimate authority over land and other peri-urban issues. (Schlimmer, 2021, p. 4).

Conclusion and recommendations

38The study shows that the peri-urban transformation of the Nairobi Metropolitan Area is not simply the result of demographic pressure or metropolitan expansion, but is territorially structured by the enduring legacy of colonial land demarcations and postcolonial inequalities in land access. The Nairobi case reflects a wider regional trajectory observed in Kampala and Dar es Salaam, where colonial land legacies and contemporary market forces converge to shape unequal peri-urban transitions. The Raini boundary, originally established to separate settler-owned estates from African smallholder reserves, continues to function as a material and symbolic frontier that shapes contemporary land markets, planning regimes, and socio-economic opportunities. This shows that colonial boundaries operate as durable spatial infrastructures shaping metropolitan expansion in the area. While real estate development projects like Tatu City promise modernity, they often reproduce patterns of exclusion rooted in colonial land regimes. The peri-urban expansion does not erase the colonial boundary, but instead, reactivates it within speculative urban economies that reinforce socio-spatial inequalities. The livelihoods of smallholder dairy farmers and informal vendors are particularly vulnerable to these transitions. Urban growth in the metropolitan periphery therefore unfolds unevenly, reflecting historically produced asymmetries in land ownership, infrastructure provision, and access to capital. As land becomes more valuable, informal actors are squeezed by rising costs, police enforcement, and infrastructural neglect. Yet, their adaptive strategies in the form of diverse sourcing strategies, informal labour networks, and value chain participation demonstrate resilience and ingenuity.

39The study shows that the uncontrolled expansion of the capital City of Nairobi into the peri-urban zone poses risks to the environmental, social, and economic outcomes. The urban sprawl taking place at the edge of Ruiru town, at the boundary of Githunguri Sub-county is ‘eating’ into the agricultural land, threatening food production and the loss of flora and soil. It also poses a risk of disrupting the livelihoods of the rural population who may not have skills to benefit from this peri-urban transformation and may be affected by gentrification due to the attractive returns of real estate investments compared to their agrarian livelihoods. The decline of the coffee sector initiated processes of agrarian restructuring in which land was progressively detached from its primary agricultural function to a financial and speculative asset. As agricultural profitability declined and metropolitan land values rose, land use shifted to the more profitable real estate investment. The study reveals that the large coffee plantations have remained exploitative to the adjacent rural population through forced labour during the colonial times and cheap labour after independence to date. The colonial Raini boundary between the large-scale coffee plantations and the smallholder farmers signifies the social divide between the rich and the poorer income groups. The social exclusion associated with this colonial boundary has significantly remained the same. The current real estate and industrial transformations of Tatu City fails to address this social exclusion, as it creates an exclusive new town that is attracting a stream of cheap labour from the adjacent BTL, Ngewa and Ruturu areas.

40The study reveals that peri-urban zones are not neutral spaces of transition, but historically layered landscapes where past land regimes intersect with present-day speculative capital. A territorial approach to peri-urban planning must acknowledge these tensions. Rather than enforcing arbitrary rural-urban binaries, planners and policymakers should recognize the historical legacies of inequality and work toward more inclusive and negotiated urbanization. This includes securing land rights, investing in rural infrastructure, and creating space for informal economies to thrive within regulated frameworks. The study reveals how ambiguous peri-urban boundaries lead to uncoordinated urban growth and recommends that there should be clear governance frameworks, effective land administration systems, sustainable urban planning and enforcement of development control to set the limits of the towns in order to reduce backwash effects and encourage compact development to utilize the limited land resources optimally.

41Planning for this peri-urban space should be harmonized through regional development plans to build on the unique roles that both urban and rural areas play and their interactions, creating avenues for collaboration and partnerships rather than competition between the two areas while supporting informal economies and smallholder adaptation. There should also be clear urban boundary delineation for controlled extension, and inclusive governance that mitigates gentrification. Stronger application of Kenya’s land laws is essential, including enforcement of development control under the Physical and Land Use Planning Act, 2019, integrated county spatial plans, and protections of agricultural land.