Economics of sustainability

Introduction:

Brief was to address the following questions:

• To what extent can design practices have a meaningful, proactive, and transformative impact on driving factors that shape current urban realities or the relationship between urban and rural areas?
• Can we think of any example in which either the wider economic performance of a country, a region or a city has been a limiting factor for architecture and urbanism or architectural and urban design decisions have hampered or promoted socioeconomic development?

Process:

After reading the brief the only city that came in my mind was: Mumbai. The city where I grew up, the city which has many faces, the city which never sleeps and boasts of a history far fetched. The space problem in Mumbai has never been as apparent as it is today. South Mumbai is saturated with no large pieces of land available. The open land in Mumbai can only be identified as parks, maidans, playgrounds which act as lungs to the city. Recent suggestions on development of mill lands have opened avenues. These spaces for long have been left inert as the revival of these spaces didn’t seem likely. Price index of Mumbai is still extremely high as compared to other Asian cities.

Till a few decades ago, mills were the only pieces of land that defined a way of living. The land on which these mills thrived defined the way of living for nearly four decades after India got her independence in 1947. Nearly 600 hectares of mill land in Mumbai (then Bombay) was a point of existence for a population over one million. It was probably the largest industry in the world where more than one million people were employed. The mills were a symbol of development and prosperity, which also created a new ethos and culture for the city. There were a lot of other aspects that came alive during this period of time. One could classify the mill era into two broad categories – the mill and the workers and their social life which essentially gave rise to Mumbai’s culture. From the 1950’s the textile mill began to face severe set backs, ending with prolonged labour strikes in the 1980’s. Subsequently, many mills were either nationalized or closed down and majorities have become redundant as newer sophisticated machinery has replaced workers.

The potential to recycle Mumbai mill lands is critical to the future of Mumbai city, for a densely populated metropolis, with one of the smallest ratios of open spaces and, one of the highest real estate prices the world over. Thus a unique opportunity must be capitalized upon without any further delay. First, the land belonging to all the mills should be viewed as an important city resource that can be realized only after preparing an integrated development plan for all the mills. An extensive survey viable and potentially viable mill should be carried out. Some of the mills may be modernized; some may be redeveloped for a new function.

Cognitive process:

Time is constant. It waits for nobody. It moves on its own with no one to provoke it and everybody moves according to its tune. So we spend every day trying to keep up and stay in sync with it and manage our own lives in whatever capacity possible. Time works within a very rigid structure. 60 seconds make a minute; 60 minutes make an hour, and so on. It’s a strict pattern which continues indefinitely. In our own undefined ways over the years, we create for ourselves, a rigid pattern in our own lives that is in all probability sub-conscious to most. We create a routine for ourselves that is created primarily to set some kind of structure in our own lives.

People, in today’s metropolis have become self centered and are largely concerned with their own world. Self gain is the primary concern of most. The urge to succeed and achieve had increased tremendously, only resulting in the overall increase of stress levels of people in the city. Everyone is constantly trying to create their own space within the city while their walking through the streets, sitting on a bench, or merely by even just standing waiting at a bus stop. This is the challenge that I feel most of us face in our metropolis. We live in a city that not only looks saturated but feels utterly claustrophobic.

This sort of mechanical behavior is observed in day-to-day life. Because the metropolis is designed in a certain fashion, the flats or the units that we live in all have a certain language and tend to affect the way we move, behave and perceive society. For example, when we use the lifts in our buildings, we can estimate the exact number of seconds it takes to travel from the second floor to the ground floor; this is because we have been a part of this working system for years. While crossing a road, we can estimate the speed of the moving car and how much time it would take to come near us before which it isn’t safe to cross the road. Over the years we have mastered the art of the complex relationships between space distance and time. Similarly, the type of building, their placement in the metropolis, the people using a particular area, the activities practiced in that space, all define the manner in which we choose to operate unconsciously.

This ultimately results in the nature of our behavior and in turn the aura of the metropolis. Thus as a result the city is under constant surveillance of authorities that constantly hinder our actions in public. This entire mechanism gives rise to “set patterns” being developed within the city. This directly affects our lives and sub-consciously affects the manner in which we choose to operate. We then tend to set up a sense of self in the society by following in line with these set parameters. Each one sets up their own level of comfort within the city, developing a set routine that often leads to the “urban fatigue” that we experience in our city.

Conclusion:

In some way, we ourselves become the machine that helps the city function. And in turn the city helps assist the machine to function. This entire mechanism gives rise to “set patterns” being developed within the city. This directly affects our lives and sub-consciously affects the manner in which we choose to operate. Each one sets up their own level of comfort within the city, developing a set routine that often leads to the “urban fatigue” that we experience in our city.

Economics of Sustainability: Bombay to Mumbai – A bizarre transformation is a project of IaaC, Institute for Advanced Architecture of Catalonia developed at Master of Advanced Architecture in 2015/16 by:

Student:

• Dhairya Thakkar

Faculty:

• Gonzalo Delacamara