Let’s give TOD a fair chance

Cities are a direct manifestation of the policies that try to control and manage how they grow, redevelop and evolve. Policy frameworks at the city level, often seen in India as being cumbersome, restrictive and regressive, have the potential to become the greatest enablers for the creation of great cities. However, this requires vision, commitment to city building and a comprehensive multidisciplinary understanding of how cities perform and behave. Unfortunately, our decision makers at the city level fail to meet this pre-requisite more often than not.

New brave policy initiatives to restructure, regenerate or catalyse cities are often met with great opposition. The three biggest barriers to bringing about positive change in our urban environments are a) Lack of data. There is no platform for comprehensive, high quality data on cities that can not only underpin sound planning but also help convince decision makers of the key imperatives of the policy b) The need to ‘fit into’ the existing policy framework or structure i.e ‘round pegs for round holes’. A new approach to city building or ‘Square pegs’ not only challenge the familiar but also reveal the shortcomings of the existing and are therefore, resisted if not vehemently opposed and c) Apathy of the decision makers. Do they really understand cities and more importantly, do they really care? India is urbanising at an unprecedented pace today. Simultaneously, our cities are undergoing rampant and sustained degeneration, crumbling under the pressures of increasing densities, hampered mobility and inadequate service infrastructure. While mass urbanisation and high densities provide massive economic opportunities, the abysmal condition of our cities impacts quality of life for all and the ease of doing business for enterprises. This will only compound with time. If cities are to grow into robust, thriving and sustainable centres, we need to understand the emerging behavioural trends and patterns. And, ‘design’ our policies to enable and pro-actively manage sustainable growth. The new Transit Oriented Development (TOD) policy adopted in July 2015 in the Master Plan for Delhi 2021 (MPD) was a brave attempt at doing just that.

TOD is essentially any development, macro or micro, that is focused around a transit node, and facilitates complete ease of access to the transit facility, thereby inducing people to prefer to walk and use public transportation over personal modes of transport. TOD policies mostly use enhanced development rights as a tool to catalyze redevelopment. The TOD policy for Delhi also allows greater development but at its heart, is inclusive, egalitarian and environmentally sustainable, placing the every-day city dweller at its centre. It also aims to put an end to urban sprawl by encouraging sustainable urban environments with lower carbon footprints. These simple yet essential goals, however, required a paradigm shift in planning across scales. The following three departures from the norm are worth noting.

TOD is essentially any development, macro or micro, that is focused around a transit node, and facilitates complete ease of access to the transit facility, thereby inducing people to prefer to walk and use public transportation over personal modes of transport. TOD policies mostly use enhanced development rights as a tool to catalyze redevelopment.

Mixed use, Mixed income – Planning policy in Delhi is founded on regulating development by way of segregating landuses across areas and districts where quantum of development permissible is linked to the use type ascribed to a certain plot/parcel. TOD, is its complete misnomer. TOD for Delhi envisioned a variety of high-density, mixed-use, mixed-income buildings, within a short distance of a rapid transit network to encourage use of public transport. This required the creation of a flexible policy framework wherein parcels and buildings could accommodate multiple use types over time based on market dynamics. Coupled with robust regulations for affordable (not EWS) housing, the TOD policy aims at creating a massive stock of smaller unit sizes across the city to meet the huge demand and make the city more equitable. In order to improve the quality of life, the TOD policy also mandates the creation of public open spaces that are to be handed back to the urban local bodies once delivered.

Mobility linked spatial planning – Mobility patterns of city-dwellers is guided by the type and quality of infrastructure provided. While infrastructure enhancement in Delhi has always been focused on the private vehicle, the TOD policy aimed at the making Delhi pedestrian and non-motorised transit friendly. This not only entailed creating a policy framework for a finer network of public streets to provide route choices, equitable distribution of road space for all modes and good quality streetscape but also the use of spatial planning tools such as Influence Zone Plan (IZP) to enable delivery. The IZP ensures that planned high density developments and all supporting infrastructure within a TOD – street networks, social infrastructure, public utilities and public open space – is coordinated and rigorously assessed before implementation.

Zero Setbacks – It was also necessary that our streets became engines for economic growth and safe for all. This led to the other critical departure that was required to make TOD successful. The ‘setback’ is an essential part of Delhi’s urban fabric. Buildings on every parcel of private land above a certain size (mostly 100 sqM) are required to be set back a certain distance from the public road edge. This was a major barrier to TOD as mixed use developments require an immediate interface with the public street for its business and the increased pedestrians and NMT users require safe streets that could only be achieved through passive surveillance by activities in adjoining developments. The TOD Policy, therefore, requires no setback.

Today, however, this visionary policy is under threat. On 24 April 2016, the Delhi Development Authority, through its public notice proposed amendments to the TOD policy. The changes grossly compromise three direct benefits to the people of Delhi – a) Fine network of new public streets dominated by pedestrians and cyclists, b) Supply of housing for the middle class of Delhi and c) Public Open Spaces. If these proposed amendments are accepted, Delhi’s transit corridors will become exclusive gated enclaves, intensifying the social, economic and environmental fractures the city is experiencing. Brave new initiatives such as the TOD policy for Delhi need champions to push them through. They need risk-takers who are willing to test it out. If TOD is too new, too unfamiliar, have the courage to try it out, just once. But do not make compromises. Do not shave the edges of a square peg to fit a round hole. Create that one square hole and all the right tools to make the perfect fit. Try TOD in its purest form, just once. The City may just get the ‘precedent’ it has been waiting for.