Vision of Life; by Sanjay: UDPCR, Rain & the City!

“Planning is for the world's great cities, for Paris, London, and Rome, for cities dedicated, at some level, to culture. Detroit, on the other hand, was an American city and therefore dedicated to money, and so design had given way to expediency.”

― Jeffrey Eugenides

Jeffrey Kent Eugenides is an American author. He has written numerous short stories and essays, as well as three novels & he is a resident of Detroit, which was once the most prospering city of America & an Automobile hub of the world!! I said once as his above quote about planning tells the story of the deterioration of the city in later stage & why I remembered Jeffrey’s above quote is, recent rain created havoc on roads we witnessed in Pune & more than that the reactions of so called Punekars about the rain havoc & blaming it on UDPCR! We all witnessed (rather, are witnessing) every monsoon what happens to Pune’s not just low-lying areas but even those localities which are on higher altitude also. As usual local governing bodies (PMC/ PCMC) & govt named nature god for the destruction the rains bring along & the sufferers (read as citizens) name their bad luck & the “Thinkers of Pune” (this is separate class of citizens) always like to blame every such bad thing happening to the city to some entity & this time they have blamed the rain caused damage to UDPCR! Well, those lucky souls who doesn’t knows UDPCR then it’s not builders or any segment of industry but a policy for urban town planning which has been passed by our State govt nearly three years back & is applicable to most of the urban towns & cities of the State barring few regions such as Mumbai Municipal Corporation (Some will say because that’s already beyond repair, but that’s another subject of sharing). Now you may wonder how can some policy related to urban planning can be responsible for the rains & floods it caused, & my sharing is exactly about your this question, so if you are interested then read ahead!

First, we will have to understand the rain & floods situation which is getting bad every year while the rainfall by average quantity is nearly the same per year but its pattern is changing & that’s happening all around the world, so only Pune is not getting step-child treatment by Gods, mind it! Then why suddenly this flooding on the roads, water entering in the societies & rivers as well streams swelling & damaging compound walls along started happening, is the next question you will ask & here comes the urban town planning in the picture which eventually makes us meet UDPCR thingy! I have been staying in Pune for the last 35 years & indeed earlier the rains used to be the same on average rainfall quantity but the pattern was, it used to rain continually moderate showers over the longer periods & not unlike today's burst of down pouring. As this type of rain makes it difficult to dispose of the rainwater which falls on the ground & called as Runoff & it’s this Runoff volume of water which is the cause of damage, the outcome of our wrong town planning policies is what thinkers’ groups are saying! As apart from change of rain pattern one more thing has changed in the last 30 years & that is the way city has developed in these years as very little earth cover & earth’s crest also available for absorbing the rain water which or else flows on the surface but then this hasn’t happened in two-three years & UDPCR has come in just last three years! I am not protecting or supporting UDPCR, I am just putting facts to analyse as I too am a civil engg, builder but more than that I am citizen of this city & I care for the city, disclaimer, lol! Yet, the Thinkers have claimed that it’s the UDPCR which is the only reason for the sorry situation of the city during monsoons so let’s see how & why UDPCR is being blamed!

Before analysing impact of UDPCR on city planning we should look at the history of Pune city’s urban growth which is on the rise since last three decades & UDPCR or no UDPCR we never thought of earth cover & its importance, is a fact as any new building can be built only by removing the topsoil cover & we needed homes so the earth cover has to go & that kept happening every year in last thirty years is something we are not taking in to account. At the same time, we started building our homes wherever possible & where legally it was not possible then the homes were (and are) built illegally, damaging not just the earth cover but damaging the natural course of the water flows & storages, which we call as streams & rivers & lakes also! The city was & is prospering because we all wanted Education Institutes, IT Parks, Industries & many such as these are our growth engines & today everybody wants to get associated with Pune for their respective career, and for this each of us is responsible as we too are beneficiary of all this growth, right? Problem is, nobody either never thought or ignored the very basic fact that all this growth of the city will attract millions of people in a concentrated piece of land (read as city) & they will need buildings for their homes, schools, shopping, health , entertainment as well these people will need services, roads & many such things which again will need land & every such structure will be an obstruction for natural water flow as well will reduce water absorption capacity of this city which has become like an epicentre of earthquake only the earthquake is in the form of population explosion but the outcome will be same i.e. a disaster!

This was the scene before UDPCR coming in picture on the scene of urban planning & with UDPCR more buildable area was permitted i.e. increase in FSI/ TDR in many ways (please google for FSI / TDR meaning as I am too tired to explain that) making more buildable area possible on the very same land. In nut shell if on a plot of say 10000 sft i.e. 100 ft x 100 ft if earlier 15 flats of 2 bhk were allowed to build then now with UDPCR policy we can build nearly double also i.e. 30 flats of 2 bhk. This move was to boost urban growth & with a thought that if we can’t increase the land then let’s increase the land potential to build more homes so the home prices will come down, a very noble thought & it did succeed in some way but that's a different subject of sharing! What impact this has made on city real estate industry is, every land holder became richer double or triple times that too overnight with potential of his land got increased & all these lands are available now for development & there are builders & why blame just builders but govt is also getting money with every sq ft of this development in every possible form (read as taxes). But what we forget once again is, all this development is going to damage the earth cover faster, as this time it's for the added flat’s parking & essential services we are required to dig basements, so lesser scope for rain water percolation & more flood water on roads & everywhere! The problem is not UDPCR, problem is our short sightedness to implement it as today its rainwater we are blaming but what if there are less rains, then there won't be problem of floods but then from where we will be supplying water to all these buildings, have we thought of it & that’s already happening! Dear Thinkers of Pune, we are witnessing biggest joke (read as failure) of urban planning as in city (PMC/ PCMC limits) we oppose UDPCR or new developments for avoiding floods i.e. excess water & outside of city (PMRDA limits) we oppose new development for our inability to supply the water for this development, wonderful planners we are, aren’t we?

And then it's not just UDPCR, our entire approach to urban planning is weird as we are building Metro which already is two decades late & to run Metro in profit, we come up with the idea of having more density in city centre with smaller flats along Metro track but this is adding more burden of city in every possible form, this aspect we are forgetting! At the same time, we must allow the buildings to go higher for our parking & such needs than allowing them to dig in the earth & damaging earth's water absorption capacity permanently & for that we need to modify our approach towards urban planning, which we are ignoring. And one more damage is happening to the city by rampant development & that is, reduction in new green cover as well due to hard paving the roots of existing trees also are getting weak as less water is available for them & this is why numbers of trees falling even is small burst of rains is increasing constantly, causing reduction in existing green cover also!

Finally, what about illegal buildings as even with UDPCR in place common man can’t afford a legal home in & around Pune city is the sole reason of increase in illegal homes which are being built on the hills & in the river beds too, but our leaders are happy in making announcements in regularising such illegal homes than forming a right policy to balance growth & nature, & our thinkers blame UDPCR for floods, great! And UDPCR was not made overnight, it’s a law also in a way & why nobody protested or pointed these flaws while its making, is something I want to ask all the Thinkers & this doesn’t mean we can’t make changes to UDPCR, but don’t put all blame on some pages of a rulebook for our shortsightedness, is what I want to tell! As well, high time for the builders (sorry developers) in the city to stop the rat race for consuming more & more FSI just the way for our body’s fitness even if we have enough money to buy any quantity of food we eat in control, same way let's consume the FSI in controlled way even govt is giving it free!

Guys, rains were there, are there & will be there as its nature’s cycle, point is are we going to learn to live at peace with nature & make our policies accordingly because if we keep on insisting on our greedy policies without caring for nature then the nature also will do the same to us & we all know who will be the loser in that game, adios with this warning dear Thinkers of Pune!

Sanjay Deshpande

smd156812@gmail.com

Sanjeevani Dev.

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https://visonoflife.blogspot.com/2024/01/choosing-your-home-along-with-future-of.html

http://jivnachadrushtikon.blogspot.com/2023/02/blog-post.html

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