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Focus areas/Street design

Street design

We support research, design guidance and pilots that make lighting, drainage, signage and shade work together for people on foot.

Contents

About this area

A street is more than its carriageway. Lighting, drainage, signage and the space in front of buildings decide whether it is safe and pleasant to walk. In Nigerian cities these are provided by different agencies, often to different specifications, so streets in the same city can differ markedly in what they offer.

An ICIR investigation reported dark streets in Lagos despite a N4bn lighting programme, and a 2026 study found lighting provision divided between government, private and community actors. Open drains often sit beneath the footpath, and the strip in front of property fences is used for parking, generators and gatehouses.

Our grants in this area address that gap in five strands:

  • Lighting, measuring how many streetlights work at night and who keeps them working.
  • Drains and footpaths, designing covered drains that double as level footpaths.
  • Frontages, setting out how the space between the fence and the road should be used and kept clear.
  • Signage and wayfinding, developing a common specification for street names and directions.
  • Shade on walking routes, identifying where street trees would make the walk to work, school and the bus cooler. Satellite data for 2025 puts tree cover at 2% of the Lagos urban area.

Interested in supporting this area? Contact us.

Research agenda

Open questions in this area. Students, researchers and entrepreneurs may take up a question or propose their own within it.

What share of streetlights on a sample of Lagos roads works at night?
Open
What should a common specification for street name signs include?
Open
How can a covered drain be built to serve as a level, continuous footpath?
Open
Which agency owns each element of a Lagos street, from the drain to the streetlight?
Open
Where on busy walking routes would street trees give the most shade?
Open

Resources

Evidence on street services in Lagos.

Our database, 2026Street rulebook Research, 2026African Cities Research Consortium on street lighting InvestigationICIR, Darkness in Lagos despite N4bn lighting project Policy, 2018Lagos Non-Motorised Transport Policy Data, 2025HUGSI, Lagos green and tree cover
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