New urban spaces, the way to go?

Cities are struggling to cope with the rapid influx of populations. The legacy of ageing infrastructure and unplanned sprawl dampens their efforts and prevents an efficient and effective response to the aspirations of inhabitants. It may be time to look at building brand new cities with the best of modern technologies and infrastructure rather than just prop up existing cities…..

Sometime in the future one could be travelling between Delhi and Gurgaon in an elevated cabin called Pod several metres above the ground in comfort and speed, avoiding all the traffic congestion and pollution on the roads. The taxi like shuttle operation could provide much needed relief to regular commuters on the route. The project is under active consideration and a few safety related concerns are reportedly being addressed.

This Pod Taxi project also called as Personal Rapid Transit (PRT) is among the various transformative, out-of-the-box solutions (a bus capable of moving on land as well as water was another one tried out in Mumbai) several cities are proposing to address urban mobility, a stubborn challenge faced by them. But urban mobility is just one of the several nightmarish challenges. Water supply, waste management and affordable housing are others which are engaging policy makers and urban practitioners as cities face the onslaught of rapid and relentless urbanisation. As people move in large numbers from the rural hinterland to cities in search of better livelihood, there will be increasing strain on city managers to meet their aspirations.

Urbanisation is a common thread running through countries, regions and continents the world over and the trend is expected to continue. The phenomenon is even more sharply evident in countries like India where agriculture and related sectors employ a disproportionately high percentage of the population while occupying a smaller share of the GDP pie. Here farming employs more than 50 per cent of the total workforce while the sector contributes 17-18 percent of the GDP (Economic Survey 2017-18).

Professionals have argued that cities must learn to welcome the new urban dwellers rather than view the phenomenon of urbanisation as some kind of calamity. And rightly so. However there could be limits to each city’s capability to continually meet the demands and provide services to large numbers of new urban dwellers in a sustainable manner. Foo Say Boon, architect and urban planner of Singapore, in an interview to this magazine, argued that every city needs a defined ‘carrying capacity’ before it is allowed to expand. This according to him is necessary because every city has finite resources especially natural ones like forests, parks and lakes and it is necessary to protect these to ensure sustainability. “Carrying capacity of a city has to be considered at the planning stage. Without that, quality of life cannot be provided to the citizens”, he said.

More cities, new cities, better livability.

If populations will continue to move from villages and smaller towns to the city and if the city has a limit to accommodate more residents then it is obvious that we need to add more cities rather than adding more muscle to the same cities. Mid-sized cities could most likely provide better quality of life to its citizens. A 2017 survey by the Economist Intelligence Unit ranked Melbourne as the most livable city in the world. It was the record seventh time in a row, from 2011 to 2017, that this city topped the chart. Others in the top ten included Vienna, Vancouver, Toronto, Calgary, Adelaide,Perth, Auckland, Helsinki and Hamburg. One can see that these are all mid-sized cities with modest densities. Note also that wealthier cities like London, New York and Tokyo do not make it to the top ten. So wealth itself did not seem to count for much.

So how does one go about building new cities which are livable too? Primarily to attract the migration from rural centres, the city needs to offer livelihood options. This again will become possible with growing population which can be served by the incoming migrants. Sub national and local governments will need to actively promote industry and the services sector by appropriate interventions to enable the new city offer greater livelihood opportunities. In addition there needs to be focus on aspects such ashousing, education, healthcare, sanitation, mobility, open spaces, recreation, power, waterand clean air, all of which go towards enhancing or compromising the livability of a city. All these need attention, mainly by the local government. Existing cities, notably the larger ones, have been hosting migrant populations for many decades. At the same time they have ageing, crumbling infrastructure such as water supply and drainage networks making service provision increasingly challenging, thereby compromising livability. While upgrading existing smaller towns may seem easier, building Greenfield modern cities too is happening in a big way the world over.

Songdo in South Korea is one example. Designed as an alternative to the bustling and overcrowded Seoul, Songdo is among the world’s ‘smartest’ cities. With a string of high rise LEED certified buildings and green building certification by United States Green Building Council, Songdo was built from scratch. This city, about 60 Kms from the Capital Seoul was built on about 600 hectares of reclaimed land. The city is designed as a lighthouse project in terms of sustainability with large spaces devoted to cycling and walking tracks, parks, open spaces and recreation. It offers encouragement for use of electric vehicles and has superior waste collection and management systems. The City uses state-of-the-art technologies to build in ‘smartness’. For example the city is wired with sensors to track traffic flow, energy consumption, temperature, and to provide alerts to the local body. There is no ‘handling’ of waste. Waste is sucked out from homes into a network carrying it to processing plants for converting into energy.

Other examples of such new master-planned cities include Putrajaya in Malaysia, Dompak in Indonesia, King Abdullah Economic City in Saudi Arabia and our own Amaravati, the under-construction capital city of Andhra Pradesh. While there is some criticism of certain aspects of these projects, it anyway seems the way to go if we are to achieve sustainable urbanisation and enhanced livability for citizens. Care is necessary however, to ensure that these new developments do not turn out to be hi-tech, ‘gated’ enclaves and communes for the elite among the population. The use of technology should work to improve efficiency and transparency; and not result in exclusion of the less literate and less tech savvy. Inclusivity should remain a central principle governing the planners’ efforts while crafting such urban spaces. These new cities should be designed as independent urban spaces with their own governance, economy and social identities; not as suburbs or urban sprawls to accommodate that which the main city could not.

The new urban spaces need to be a worthy response to the aspirations of the tens of thousands of people moving to cities in search of a better quality of life. A response that is efficient, inclusive and above all sustainable.

If populations will continue to move from villages and smaller towns to the city and if the city has a limit to accommodate more residents then it is obvious that we need to add more cities rather than adding more muscle to the same cities