Urban Planning Blog

Quick calculations showed that, given construction costs in the 1990s, profits made from the market-rate sale of 560 apartments would finance 1,000 free homes for slum-dwellers. So, to give away 160,000 homes, developers would have to sell almost 90,000 full-price homes. In total, they would have to build 250,000 each year.

In an insightful article, Dilip D’Souza, writing for the Outlook section in the Washington Post explains the futility of the current slum redevelopment schemes in Mumbai.

I will always welcome the transfer of public property into private hands, and even the most left-liberal activist will agree that it is more preferable to hand over property rights to the “little guy” transparently than to big evil builders after intense backroom dealings.

Gaurav Sabnis, an Indian blogger takes the argument further and advocates transferring property rights to slum dwellers thus giving them a better say in negotiations with the builders.

My uncle, a builder and developer in the Mumbai suburbs runs his construction business through the model that Dilip suggests i.e. by redeveloping properties which have surplus FSI (Floor Space Index) and effectively giving free homes to the original residents while making the profit off the additional housing units that he sells at market rate. More on the impact of that strategy for the housing condition in Mumbai later.

Mukesh Ambani, India’s richest person is building a monstrous residence in the heart of densely-populated Mumbai. The structure is 490 feet tall and includes a corporate meeting facility along with his 35,000 square feet of private residence. Arzan however is impressed by the architectural aspects of the structure which might change the way high rises are built in dense Indian cities.

Ash talks about the adverse environmental impacts of religious festivities in India. But I am glad that things are changing and people are taking remedial steps to reverse such damage.

Ganesh Chaturthi is an annual religious festival celebrated by Hindus in India. It has grown from household worship to societal celebration involving huge idols of the elephant god.

Mumbai is where I spent most of my life before heading west. Technically, it is the land of my ancestors although it is an immigrant city which incidentally is also the best thing about it. But the geography of the city i.e. the long peninsula stretching out along the mainland into the Arabian sea has a reassuring effect on the stressed life of its inhabitants.

The Mumbai Metroblogging Blog lists the seven most popular waterfront public locations that brings back memories. Professionally, waterfronts have been close to me since my design dissertation during my undergraduate years was based on waterfront revitalization.

co-authored by Rohit Pradhan

Back in the days when Doordarshan (Indian state television) ruled the airwaves, if you tuned in during the weather forecast, you wouldn’t be completely off the mark if you thought that India’s urban regions comprised solely of Delhi, Calcutta, Bombay, and Madras – conveniently located in four corners of India. It was the natural corollary of India’s development since independence that has always been centered on its millions of villages. The idea of making villages self-sufficient drew its sustenance from the rather utopian Gandhian ideals. India’s early leaders also believed in heavy industrialization which led to development of cities like Jamshedpur–modeled primarily along industrial cities like Detroit in the developed world. The ‘Great Leap Forward’ (in stark contrast to its Chinese counterpart), came only after the post-1991 liberalization when India embarked on a path of economic reforms and globalization. The impact of rapid liberalization and expansion of opportunities were profound especially on the morphology of Indian cities.

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While the housing market in the United States is going belly up, the construction boom in India refuses to subside. With the new economy booming, demand for city housing is at an all-time high. However with incomplete and insufficient information and awareness, consumers can be duped by unscrupulous developers who promise the moon but fail to deliver even a rock. Before the age of the Internet, you couldn’t do much except perhaps bad-mouth the developer and warn your friends off. The developer always won after finding enough suckers for his dubious scheme.

But thanks to Youtube, blogs and other new-age Internet technologies, getting your opinion out there is much easier. One such disgruntled customer from property developers, Unitech Group shot a video comparing the promises with the end result and uploaded it on the web. The result - many potential buyers are now warned and have begun withdrawing their bookings with the firm (see comments).

One quick observation about ground realities in India. Suing is not particularly common and even if you do, the lawsuit takes ages and is often considered not worth your time. So in that spirit, spreading the word about dubious practices of developers via a mass-media outlet like YouTube does maximum damage to the property developers. Hopefully, this correction in information asymmetry will give more power to the consumer and make developers more accountable. The video is attached below:

Incidentally, websites set up to complain against errant homebuilders is not a new phenomenon in the United States. The following websites do exactly that - hold homebuilders accountable and spread the word on dubious practices:

1. Homeowners Against Deficient Dwellings (HADD).
2. Homeowners for Better Building (HOBB).
3. Crap Construction.
4. Exposing New Homebuilders.
5. Neighborhoods for Quality Homes.

Targeted sites towards specific construction companies are pretty popular:

1. K. Hovnanian Homes Suck and Not Khov.
2. Levitt & Sons Problems.
3. The Pulte Homes Experience, Fight Pulte, and My Pulte Experience.
4. Stop BEAZER Homes.

Mind you, I am not an anti-business individual but simply believe in holding any organization that is providing a service accountable. More information is always a good thing. So share your opinions and reviews of your home-buying experience. Even if you have had a good experience, you might want to share it so as to encourage good business practices that provide good customer satisfaction.

The ‘white flight’ to the suburbs was followed by other citizens who well, were not so white. When the Fair Housing Act criminalizing racial discrimination in housing came into effect followed by the gradual decline of exclusionary zoning practices like redlining, etc, communities hunkered down further by creating the ‘gated community’. Justified in the name of keeping out crime and other evil social conditions [although not always true], the gated community was the ultimate in creating a Truman’s Show world provided you had the money and of course, the right ‘attributes’. The homeowners association probably the strongest private body that can at times be so un-American played the role of the gatekeeper and of course, law-enforcer and isolator if you ever managed to crash the gates.

In a increasingly globalized world and with the leveling of the playing field that Friedmann mistook for the flatness of the world, gated communities are making a foray in Indian cities. Expats are returning home and wish to duplicate the good life of their U.S. experiences. The market obliges and provides them with their own haven. Welcome to Palm Meadows:

It is a gated community of about 600 single family homes, with 10 or more security guards manning the gates at any given time. Some houses are big and some are small, but most houses have at least three bedrooms each. Residents of Palm Meadows are a mix of original owners, returning Indians and expats [source: Blogpourri].

Heck, even the name is U.S.-centric and trust me, I have never seen a meadow of palms. But leaving that aside, it does appear to provide all you could wish for to eke out a luxurious living. Of course, considering the clients and homeowners are considered to be rich and ‘earning in dollars’, prices are steep and as Sujatha mentions, collusion among the real estate agents have hiked up the rents further. Of course, some of that wealth trickles down to the domestic help. In India, it is quite common to have domestic help, even the middle-class families have them. The only difference is in the price.

Of course, you can enjoy all you want while you are inside Palm Meadows but once you cross the gates, not even God can help you navigate through that dreaded Bangalore traffic.

Brilliant image, eh? (click here to enlarge). These are the days I wish I was in Mumbai but then again, I rather not.

Much ink has been spilled ( or bytes consumed) discussing Lata Mangeshkar’s alleged threat to quit Mumbai if the flyover on Peddar Road is built. A little bit of background if you have missed out on the story. Mumbai has been on a flyover building spree for the past 4-5 years and every time someone complains of traffic problems in Mumbai, a flyover contract is handed out. Peddar Road is one of the most congested roads in South Mumbai especially so during the rush hour which lately is anytime between 8am to 8pm. Lata Mangeshkar, the ‘voice of India’ is using her clout and indulging in emotional blackmail by stating that she will leave Mumbai if the flyover on Peddar Road is built. Her reasons – considering that it is a seismic zone, it would directly impact the foundations of the buildings in the area; not to mention bring the traffic right up to her eye level. Now the reactions to her statements have ranged from dismissive (her wish) to downright despicable (calling her all sorts of names in the abuse book).

Personally, I see it as a citizen advocacy movement. She issues such a statement simply because she knows it will catch attention. She is indulging in a classic NIMBY (Not In My Back Yard) routine and trust me, if you were in her place, you would be doing just as much or even more. You cannot justify shutting up Lata by saying that no one would listen to low-income people if they chose to protest taking of their legal property. It is a systemic problem and needs legal consultation on specifics regarding land ownership, compelling government interest, and fair distribution of costs. Honestly, I don’t see anything wrong with her statement. She would move out if she so wishes (probably it would be better for her health too) and does not even demand compensation. Housing supply is so crunched up in Mumbai that her flat would still command a hefty price tag although it should incorporate the existence of a flyover that would supposedly drive the price down. This fact alone would also deny her any compensation if she chooses to demand one.

She has chosen to make a personal statement that a public amenity (flyover) would impact her and the residents in the neighborhood the greatest; so much that it would make her reconsider living there – a place that is her home for the last 45 years. If she is stating a scientific finding (seismic zone and weakened foundations), then she should be answered relative to those concerns because they certainly raise not only a public safety issue but also a ‘taking’ of her property considering it would lose economic value. The second argument (taking of property; acquisition in Indian legalese) would probably not hold since it doesn’t result in complete loss of economic value or productive use of her property owing to the flyover. But if it requires her to move, then I guess the cost of the flyover on Lata is much more than the cost on the people that would use it. And I am not talking of the fiscal costs here.

Facts and legal arguments wouldn’t work here and instead she has chosen to make an emotional appeal; probably it has failed. Sonia Gandhi recently showed how to successfully use an emotional angle to recover from a hopeless situation. I bet she would be singing a slogan that we used on our college rivals in a sing-song manner when we have fooled them - ch#$@ banaya, bada mazaa aaya. But in this case, Mumbai seems to care less if she lives in Mumbai or not. Maybe she has exhausted her utility now.

I wonder how would people react if Sachin Tendulkar (not now but at the height of his cricketing prowess) would threaten to immigrate to Australia (just to rub it in) if a flyover was built near his home. I bet the flyover proponents would find another place for directing traffic. People, it is an emotional appeal; listen to it if you choose to or ignore it. Don’t berate the old lady for resorting to measures that we understand best.

A death blow for affordable housing in Bombay as nearly 285 acres of land occupied by defunct textile mills is proposed for sale to private builders without a component of affordable housing.

Kolkata (Calcutta) squatters vow to carry broomsticks and chili powder as defensive weapons against police violence while protesting against a court order forcing their eviction. Chili powder bombs against tear gas shells; should be an eye-burning experience. [via]

A Charles Correa-designed building, the McGovern Institute for Brain Research was opened recently on MIT campus.