Maharashtra votes 2024: How unchecked urbanisation hinders the idea of a sustainable city

Thane, more than Mumbai, has been the city to watch for an urbanist in the past few decades. From being called a poor cousin of the commercial capital, Thane, across the harbour, has expanded to become one of the high-valued urban centres in the country with a phenomenal growth in population as well as property. That a few of the highly-reputed real estate developers have made a beeline for the city in recent years and property prices are on par or above those in certain areas of Mumbai should tell its own story. Thane's population has increased about seven times between 1971 and 2011, according to Census 2011.

Besides the city, Thane district comprises other fast-growing hubs such as Navi Mumbai, Bhayander, Kalyan, Dombivli, Ulhasnagar, Vasai-Virar and others housing nearly 60 percent of the district’s population while the rest live in villages and tribal-dominated belts. It is not only among the fastest growing districts in India but also the most mixed urban-rural one. While the cities show typical markers of prosperity, the rural areas especially the tribal talukas are rank among the lowest in the country on such markers and human development indices.

The rapid urbanisation of Thane, both the city and the district, has had one predictable consequence: the depletion of natural areas, especially the many lakes in the city and its green areas. Once known as the city of lakes, with nearly 35 large and small ones, grave concerns were raised nearly a decade ago about the rising pollution in them or landfilling. One of the consequences has been repeated flooding in several new areas in the last few monsoons even as some tribal villages in the district get cut off.

In a nutshell, this represents the trend of urbanisation in Maharashtra over the decades – hyper-aggressive growth in selected areas which render them unsustainable and neglect of neighbouring rural areas. Urbanisation has largely meant more construction, increasingly of tall towers in glass and concrete as commercial or residential complexes, with a few layers of modern city trappings overlaid such as large malls and fancy retail outlets. Urbanisation ought to basically mean amenities such as potable water supply, well-laid roads and pavements, commuter-friendly connections especially at the last-mile to workplaces or homes, adequate and free open spaces, plenty of green zones, and preservation of the area’s natural and historical heritage.

These are either absent in the 20-year Development Plans drawn up or remain on the plan paper while the reality is starkly different, eventually making the city unliveable for people and unsustainable for environment. This model of urbanisation, while lucrative for a few real estate developers and property buyers, is unbeneficial for a large majority of people and detrimental to the natural environment. Yet, Maharashtra’s new-growth cities and towns have embraced this model with gusto, as have other cities around the country.

This is a concern for several reasons. Firstly, Maharashtra was among the top two urbanised states in India, the other being Tamil Nadu, according to Census 2011 data, and has continued this trajectory. More than half of Maharashtra’s population lives in its cities and towns, which have witnessed enormous boom in construction led mostly by the local or corporatised real estate lobbies without comprehensive development plans that, for example, factor in transport corridors, schools and hospitals, green spaces and water bodies.

This, in many ways, is the old and now-debunked model of urbanisation or city-making in which cities are seen merely as ‘engines of growth’ and the development happens without the context of environment, as if cities can be devoid of their natural ecology. Why is this model no longer valid? Primarily, because climate change is upon us and cities, with their large populations, have routinely witnessed extreme weather events such as heat waves and flash floods. These climate events put the lives and livelihoods of the defenceless majority, the poor, at great peril; when it floods in Thane city, daily earners like street food vendors and rickshaw drivers, for example, are the worst affected.

Secondly, this model of urbanisation has ‘gifted’ cities with the element that powerful city-makers do not want: slums and slum dwellers. Slums are the strongest symbol of the failure of urban development plans and policies. Mumbai’s growth, even with 20-year plans, led to more slums over 40 years. Dharavi’s redevelopment by the Adani Group is set to worsen this. Given the rising and exorbitant prices of real estate and the lack of affordable housing – for purchase or rent – migrants and others are forced into slums and informal settlements. Maharashtra has consistently reported the largest number of slums in India, – about 30-32 percent of all India – with Mumbai leading the list with more than 11.8 million or half its population in informal settlements. Thirdly, Maharashtra’s model, more specifically Mumbai’s, has been unofficially adopted as the default way to urbanise in many parts of India without recognising that it gives primacy to land values, creation of land banks (from the sea in Mumbai or forests in other cities), and irrational monetisation of land. This model implicitly considers all natural areas such as urban forests, green open spaces, hills, rivers and lakes as areas to be potentially exploited for construction – and profit.

Mumbai lost 2,028 hectares of tree cover in only six years between 2016 and 2022, according to the Brihanmumbai Municipal Corporation data; now its salt pan lands are being ‘developed’. Thane’s built-up area increased by 27.5 percent between 1995 and 2020 during which open spaces reduced by nearly 30 percent, wetlands by around 19 percent and mangroves by 36 percent, according to a study published in the Journal of Integrated Disaster Risk Management. Planners and developers have consistently refused to recognise these as natural buffers against flooding. Besides, the prevailing model or urbanisation makes surfaces impervious. The combined effect, naturally, is higher levels of heat, more flooding and air pollution.

Fourth, urbanisation of this kind has only led to greater levels of inequality in cities. Mumbai, and increasingly Pune and Thane too, are sites of great inequality in not only income and wealth but also in spatial and social terms. It is time to ask the question as urbanist Richard Florida did of London and New York whether the super-rich are ruining cities for others.

Urbanisation done this way is unsustainable and cannot continue – for both people and nature. And the antidotes are not nearly enough. There are ‘flood hazard plans’ or heat action plans or the Mumbai Climate Action Plans which aim to only mitigate the impacts of extreme weather events. What Maharashtra’s cities need are neighbourhood-based nature-led urban plans. These are possible if the movers and shakers listen.

Smruti Koppikar is a Mumbai-based independent journalist, essayist and city chronicler. This article is part of an 8-segment series about issues that are crucial to Maharashtra’s development.