Touba lies at the center of a regional landscape of its own manufacture. In the decades following the city's foundation, the forests and pastures within a radius of about 40 km of the holy site were cleared to make way for a network of Mouride villages, called darous. Many of the key figures of the Mouride movement participated in this process of internal agricultural colonization. This region, centered on Touba, constitutes the “Mouride heartland,” the hearth and home of its spiritual, social and cultural life.
The process of colonizing the heartland got underway in 1912, the year Cheikh Ahmadou Bamba was placed under house arrest in Diourbel. From Diourbel he was able to direct his brothers and sons as well as his closest associates to go out into the wilderness, clear the forests, and set up darous. Diourbel is thus an important urban center for the Mouride order.
Mouride darous were first of all schools (daaras) where disciples were instructed in religion. They were also agricultural villages. The disciples cultivated grain and vegetables for internal consumption and exchange as well as peanuts as a colonial export cash crop. Revenues generated by the darous provided the funds for construction of the Mosque and the city of Touba. One of the most successful of the darous is undoubtedly Darou Mousty, founded by one of Bamba's brothers in 1912. Other important shrine towns of the heartland include Mbacké Kayor, Darou Marnane, Touba Bélèl, Touba Bogo and Taïf. Each is the creation of an important Mouride sheikh and each is ordered as a smaller version of Touba.
Touba, at the center of the heartland, has grown up at the hub of a converging network of roads and tracks which have served to reinforce its central spiritual function in the Mouride universe. In practical terms, today, seven paved roads radiate from the holy city, putting Touba in a central position with regard to Senegal 's national road network.