Developing Sustainable Cities for the Future: An Urban Planner’s Perspective

Cities are centers of growth and economic development. However, every city has a limit to the number of people it can adequately accommodate. Beyond this limit, cities are unable to perform at their optimum potential. In addition to inhibiting economic growth, overpopulation in cities causes additional pressure on existing infrastructure, resource degradation, pollution, and crime. Almost every major Indian city suffers from these above issues and the congestion in the cities neutralizes every effort of the government and the people to solve them.

To tackle the issue of congested major cities, the Government of India is planning to develop smaller cities that will act as population magnets. The idea is to develop alternative destinations where people can get facilities and opportunities similar to big cities. These destinations will not only help prevent migration from small towns and rural areas to big cities but can also facilitate reverse migration from big cities and reduce their burden.

However, building and populating a new city is no easy task. Multiple agencies need to work together at multiple levels. Although developing a new city is a process that is governed by local needs and constraints, some basic principles are universally applicable to creating a populated city with sustainability in mind. Some of these principles are discussed in subsequent paragraphs.

Preserve the natural environment, agricultural land and cultural heritage

Conservation of ecology is the basic principle of sustainability. Any development that threatens to cause permanent damage to the environment must be stopped. While developing a new city or urban area, developers should keep in mind that conservation of ecology, agricultural land and cultural heritage is a pre-requisite for a successful urban settlement.

Create mixed-use and mixed-income neighborhoods

One of the biggest mistakes urban planners often make is designing cities with separate blocks or neighborhoods based on utility or income levels. For example, they create separate areas for markets, offices and residential purposes. It is also observed that in many cities people of the same income group live in particular neighbourhoods. Because of this type of urban planning, people often have to travel longer distances to buy necessities and reach their places of work. More travel means more vehicles on the roads, more congestion and thus more pollution.

Considering the case of a neighborhood where only high income families live. These families require people like maid, driver, guard, cook etc. to run their household. Since there are only high-income families in the neighborhood, helpers have to travel far and wide to work for these families. This means more time, energy and fuel is wasted getting to work. Therefore, for any city to be successful, it must create neighborhoods for mixed-use and mixed-income populations.

Design walkable streets and human-scale neighborhoods

Walking is not only good for human health but also for the health of the city. Urban planners should focus on developing roads that are easy to walk on and safe. Designated streets for walking or cycling only, streets with comfortable sidewalks, and sidewalks with plants to provide shade to pedestrians are some of the ideas that can be used to create pedestrian-friendly streets.

Another important factor in encouraging people to walk is limiting the size of neighborhoods and blocks. Due to the size of the locality, people are forced to use private vehicles. Small neighborhoods also mean a dense network of streets and access to public transportation. With smaller neighborhoods, people can easily walk to the nearest public transportation and avoid private vehicles.

Eco-friendly and efficient public transport

Efficient public transport is one of the founding pillars of a sustainable modern city. It makes transportation easy, fast and convenient by reducing the number of vehicles on the roads. Vehicular emissions are one of the biggest sources of pollution in cities. Efficient public transport can help reduce this to a great extent.

If public transport can be made environment friendly, it will be icing on the cake. Most modern cities adopt a multi-modal approach to public transport. Reliability and convenience are the two most important factors responsible for the success of any public transport. Seamless connectivity between different modes of transport makes public transport more convenient and reliable.

The above are just a few of the many principles that are essential to prepare sustainable cities for the future. India is making serious efforts to reduce its congested cities. The country and its urban planners have a huge opportunity to plan and develop sustainable cities where people can have all the opportunities and facilities in cities like Delhi and Mumbai. It is only through these cities that India will be able to harness the true economic potential of its cities.

Author: Mr. Prabhakar Kumar AVP- REPL (Rudrabhishek Enterprises Limited)