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LATEST NEWS UPDATES | Delhi's Densification Is Bound to Leave Disastrous Ecological Footprints

Delhi's Densification Is Bound to Leave Disastrous Ecological Footprints

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published Published on Jul 1, 2018   modified Modified on Jul 1, 2018
-TheWire.in

The proposed redevelopment of South Delhi will bring about a surge in congestion that will not only place an unbearable burden on public infrastructure, but also destroy an already tattered map of urban space, ecology and civility.

Aurobindo Marg was named after the renowned philosopher and guru, the Delhi campus of whose ashram lies alongside this road. Fittingly, driving on Aurobindo Marg today demands spiritual strength and yogic discipline. Heading south from the grandeur of Lutyens’s tree-lined avenues and the grace of Safdarjung’s tomb, one swoops down the flyover to come to a crawl at INA Market. Traffic must squeeze past cars that are inching their way into the parking lot. The air is laced with fumes from idling engines. From there, after the spaghetti junction at AIIMS, vehicles have to nose their way through a start-stop stream from Yusuf Sarai Market to Mehrauli and the urban dystopia that is Gurugram. Late at night, one can drive this distance in 20 minutes. During rush hour, it can take close to two hours. Plus, all the stress-busting strategies that one can summon.

So, one would think that the last thing that Aurobindo Marg needs is more traffic. Yet, that is exactly what the government is promising. Coming up at the crossing of Aurobindo Marg and the Ring Road at East Kidwai Nagar is a gigantic complex of high-rise apartments and commercial towers that is guaranteed to multiply the congestion in the area.

Add to this the redevelopment of the nearby residential colonies of Sarojini Nagar, Netaji Nagar, Nauroji Nagar, Thyagaraj Nagar, Mohammadpur and two other neighbourhoods and the prospect of choked arteries – and the air is complete.

In Sarojini Nagar and Netaji Nagar, the plan is to replace low-density houses with double the number of residential units, which could mean double the number of vehicles. However, for Sarojini Nagar’s 10,655 proposed dwelling units, the environmental clearance given by the Ministry of Environment and Forests (MoEF) approved parking facilities for an astounding 83,800 cars.

The ministry also cleared the Netaji Nagar redevelopment where 4,882 dwelling units will be accompanied by parking for 17,928 cars. The National Buildings Construction Corporation (NBCC) which has designed and is executing three of these projects says that it will provide basement parking for 70,000 cars.

Despite the puzzling discrepancies in these figures, their magnitude alone should alert us to what is in store for south Delhi – a massive injection of private vehicles onto streets already incapable of containing them. For every car that is parked is also a car that moves across the city, taking up space, emitting toxic fumes, making streets that much more hostile to those who walk, cycle and use public transport. The surge in congestion they will cause will place an unbearable burden on public infrastructure. It will also destroy an already tattered map of urban space, ecology and civility. Why, then, is the Ministry of Urban Development bent upon promoting these projects?

Densification, or increasing population per unit of land, has long been proposed as a strategy for addressing Delhi’s need for housing, commercial, and institutional space. In 2007, the Delhi Development Authority formulated Master Plan 2021, a guidemap for the city’s future growth. This document noted that the city’s government colonies and cantonment, with their characteristic sprawl of two-storeyed buildings surrounded by generous open areas and trees were an inefficient way of using land. It recommends that they be ‘densified’ through more closely-packed vertical development. (Tellingly, however, this argument was not applied to Lutyens’s Delhi where politicians and top bureaucrats reside.)

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TheWire.in, 30 June, 2018, https://thewire.in/urban/south-delhi-trees-felling-densification


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