Durban — The most noticeable feature in the pictures of Pietermaritzburg’s Tourism Information Centre and City Hall then and now is how much greener and brighter the area is in summer.

The original is from the Facebook Page whats_popping_pmb and shows the landmark colonial buildings housing the Tourism Information Centre in the foreground and the City Hall to its left in Chief Albert Luthuli Street.

A big clue to help guess the date of the old picture is the NBS sign on the building behind the City Hall. NBS was one of South Africa’s biggest banks, with its headquarters in Durban, before it went through a series of mergers starting from 1998, eventually becoming part of Nedbank in 2004.

Different season, slightly different angle: the old colonial landmark buildings of the Pietermaritzburg Tourism Information in the foreground, flanked on the left by the City Hall and behind them the former Karos Capital Towers Hotel, which is now office space. | Shelley Kjonstad Independent Media

The lovely “olde city” lamposts and Tourism Information signage have been replaced with regular (one could say characterless) street poles.

In the old picture, Karos Capital Towers Hotel is still a proud part of the hospitality world. It was first sold in 2013 and the 14-storey building has been used as office space since then.

The CBD also looks busier in the old picture, or perhaps the cold winter weather kept citizens off the streets at the time of photographer Shelley Kjonstad’s early morning shoot.

Independent on Saturday