This book is designed to bridge the persistent and frustrating gap between planning and action in the cities of the Global South. It directly confronts a common challenge: while ambitious masterplans often gather dust, the delivery of tangible, near-term results frequently falters, which in turn erodes public confidence.

In response, this guide offers a practical, sprint-based methodology for achieving visible improvements at a single precinct level in under one hundred days. Drawing from a decade of professional practice and academic research, it equips city teams with a suite of tools specifically tailored for the realities of emerging-market budgets and capacities. These include a precinct selection matrix, a step-by-step 100-Day Activation Framework, and practical finance and governance canvases. At the heart of this work is a transformative principle: to treat trust as essential infrastructure. The playbook demonstrates how to cultivate this foundational asset through early, visible successes, smart financial instruments, and transparent public dashboards from day one. By doing so, it shows how to create a virtuous cycle of public support that builds momentum and creates a sustainable pipeline of truly investable projects.

Although grounded in the realities of the Global South, where fiscal limits, informality, and fragile governance are everyday conditions, the methodology is not restricted to these contexts. Its sprint-based framework, emphasis on visible delivery, and practice of treating trust as measurable infrastructure are also relevant in Global North cities. In these environments, the playbook’s tools can accelerate action, cut through bureaucratic inertia, and build legitimacy for urgent projects such as climate adaptation, housing delivery, or post-crisis recovery. The distinction is one of urgency: in the Global South, the framework addresses systemic capacity gaps; in the Global North, it offers a means to sustain public confidence and momentum within already established systems. In both settings, the playbook redefines regeneration as a discipline centred on trust, speed, and repeatable cycles of delivery.

Lesley Takunda Mashiri is at Urban Gurus of the South Pty Ltd and University of the Witwatersrand, South Africa