Urban housing for the poor – a pipe dream?

From my recent trip to Bangalore, I felt I could well take back what I had commented earlier about the city's new airport, almost. The new airport in visual perspectives is a leap of infrastructure from what was. The distance from the town has triggered developments of transport system almost as a guilty over-compensation of a city, in having pushed its key artery way out. What was widely discussed as the major flaw as in being too far, seems its primary strength today. With the network and transport infrastructure developing well, surroundings may well benefit. With more improvements to follow, a ring road void of traffic lights, metro to the airport in another few years, things should get better. And when they do, the extended boundary of the city promises a new urban-scape and an opportunity to develop afresh. Along a distance of 30 KM out of city along N-S axis and a nearly unlimited horizontal spread in E-W axis, there is well an opportunity to build new self sufficient townships for several million more. In close continuity with a city that is already an economic powerhouse for the country.

How that opportunity is playing out is a bit different. Proper town planning in India has generally fallen by the wayside or was a flash in the pan whenever and wherever it was. Governments are generally paralysed and happy enough with monetising powers to license and authorise, than plan and complete developments for all sections of society. Builders see little benefit than in providing houses for the rich. With the result that the new areas along the way to Bangalore's new airport are developing as a disorganised, spaghetti patchwork of islands of fine, rich living amidst large tracts of what remains of villages and people deprived of their staple agriculture. Its a a skin deep statistic, easy to discover a kilometre or two into the by-roads from the airport expressways. You find housing pockets lacking clean water, electricity, healthcare and sanitation right alongside apartment and housing complex that pare with best in the world. The government and the political class benefit from both consumer groups. One segment seek hope in voting for change that new government promises and the rich seek comfort in paying off harassment that any government can enduringly provide.

Chandigarh, my hometown, was developed as a model township that future township developments could emulate. A grid based city with equitable housing allocation for all classes of society, allocation of schools, markets and healthcare facilities in order. A master blueprint available to all planners to emulate. The city now stands for an image quite different to what its founder envisioned. The model never got replicated and now exists in isolation as a one off precious artifact of global standard urban landscape in India. Not surprisingly, its property prices compare with most expensive areas in cities like London and Paris. A 2-3 bedroom floor unit of a 200 sq yard house costs anywhere in the 50 sq km block of Chandigarh costs upwards of £200,000. A 500sq yard house upwards of £600,000. In a country where per capita income is at £200 per annum, forget poor man, the place is out of reach for even the modern upper middle class. Even they are able to afford settlements in Bangalore-like spaghetti network townships bordering Chandigarh. And with the social housing pockets in Chandigarh proper having being saturated, the lower middle class and are now getting pushed out to far fringes, where schooling, healthcare, transport and good electricity and water are less certain in an anyways constrained system.

Situation in other cities are I believe no different. Better infra in town has come to mean more opportunity for government and real estate developers to make a big buck than share the infrastructure among all classes. In such backdrop, feel pessimistic about what even finest developments in infrastructure can sustainably provide in India. Photo ops for India shining story - yes, better traffic for few years - maybe, quality urban living for all sections of society - clearly not.

बैल to BIAL

Glossary : बैल is Hindi for Bullock

(Standard disclaimer: This is a fictious writeup. All resemblance to people, places, these times, issues and things is purely coincidental)

Pumpkin Times, Bangalore
In a move, that speaks of the far sight of our Government, the following plan has been mooted by the Government of Karnataka that at once eases out the problem of commute to the new International airport cost effectively, promises employment generation on a large scale, and in the long run promises to raise the water table levels of the parched Devanahalli region where at present no widespread habitation is feasible

The plan starts by mooting as follows,

The Government has proposed a dedicated bullock corridor along the National highway linking Hyderabad and branching into Bangalore along the Bellary road, Outer Ring Road, and then further on to Tumkur Road and Hosur road.

The dedicated corridor will run in parallel lanes to the existing traffic, with the difference that the divine road-usage rights exercised by cattle and politicians in India will empower the bullocks to governance free movement along the stretch.

This without a pun is expected to ensure a smooth albeit a little slow passage for all future passengers of the BIAL.

The Government is planning to hire the services of a world reknown firm in buggy design from Italy.

The contraption that will be attached to the bullocks will have capacity to carry 6 passengers at a time and 10 pieces of luggage.

The route chart will be published shortly by the newly formed BMBTC (Bengaluru Metrolpolitan Bullock Transport Corporation). There are expected to be numerous stops along the way, so the city will be catered well.

Reinforcing the experience that the passengers are expected to enjoy, will be the paratha with fresh morning butter, lassi as breakfast to the early morning commuters.

The typical bio-breaks required by the bullocks are expected to enhance this further besides contributing to developemnt of some greenery along Bangalores dirt and dust paved highways.

What makes the plan even more viable is the fact that, the cattle will ply in two directions, during the night time, from the cargo section of the airport, bringing back the precious international freight into the city on its way from the Airport to the city.

Post their ablutions and regurgitations the bullocks will be fresh to take the early morning passenger load to the BIAL.

The commute is expected to take about 3-6 hours, but due to the steady nature of commute, the positive effects on clean air and nominal charge the passengesr are expected to be more than happy.

The farmers owning these bullocks have demanded an exclusive rights to cargo movement with the Government, and the Government has kindly consented this concession.

Also for the next 3 years it has been agreed that the bullocks will be sourced only from Devanahalli region so as to provide wide scale bullock re-employment in the wake of Devanahalli region's parched nature and agricultural infeasibility.

Payment towards these services can be offered through cash, monthly passes or fodder.
Noted that payment by fodder will be exempt from service tax and various cesses. The reason is that in the process of the large scale bullock employment, the bullocks are expected to be much more well fed than they were prior to BIAL. As a result they are expected to contribute well to the arability of the land through their biological endowments such as cowdung.
The Government is expecting Industry associations along the IT Corridor to come forward and demand for chartered arrangements soon as the service is announced.
But for now the Government is keeping further details of proposal tightly wrapped at the moment, and intends to declare this as a gift to the citizens of Bangalore one day before the opening of the new Airport, and thus also have the last laugh.

More details shortly. Reporting from Devanahalli on behalf of Pumpkin Times, this is your humble Bangalorean.

Word of mouth advertising some

Over last few days over a mix of work and domestic I came across some interesting websites that I will recommend,

For those looking for some good, tutorail and encyclopaedic education on finance, capital markets and investing www.investopedia.com

I had been long searching for a website, in fact at one time even thinking of setting up one to integrate all the restauranteurs in town on a single portal where you can order a mix of chinese from Mainland China and Afghani from Samarkhand on the same day. Well! as with tons of ideas getting stacked up the dusty shelves, this one went there, but I found www.hungrybangalore.com , a good, seemingly comprehensive listing of restaurants, with a map to indicate which where and importantly an online menu to choose from. They also organize parties and am trying their service soon, so watch this space for feedback.

Another want of mine had been a utility which can take in all your financial details, bank balance, euqity, funds, assets and advise you real time on what your net worth is and suggest on what you should be doing to optimze your portfolio. I think I found something close at www.moneycontrol.com , a tool called Portfolio manager.

Well! while I find these, perhaps am still like a gleeful little kid, doing an Alice in wwwonderland, but deserving services deserve a bit of word of mouth advertising :)