Paper & Topic: GS I à Urbanization related issues

Model Answer:

Introduction:

In recent years, India’s urbanisation has grown quickly. Currently, more than 34% of us live in cities. This number is anticipated to reach 50% by 2050. While improving urban infrastructure adds significantly to the economy, it frequently results in uneven growth. The economic value of urban infrastructure is also impacted by negative externalities that affect developing economies, such as air and water pollution, climate change, flooding, and high heat events.

Body:

Benefits of urbanisation:

Cities have become the global economic hubs for trade, production, and innovation over the past 20 years.

As workforce shifts from the agricultural sector to industry and services, structural transformation can be partly blamed for the brisk economic growth typically associated with urbanisation.

Urban regions provide substantial formal and informal employment opportunities, which contribute significantly to the growth of the private sector.

Through increased productivity, more employment possibilities, better quality of life, and significant investments in infrastructure and services, urbanisation has assisted millions in escaping poverty.

The fast use of information and communications technology has contributed to the transformative force of urbanisation.

Agglomeration and scale economies can also be held responsible for it, as proximity and density lower the per capita costs of delivering infrastructure and services.

Urbanisation contributes to the specialisation and information transfer that greatly increase the productivity of city dwellers.

Urban planning’s existing framework has gaps:

Grand concepts like smart cities and industrial corridors focused on exports are being used to shape the new urban landscape in India.

Cities are primarily constructed on economic criteria, giving little thought to or value to the cultural and recreational components of human life.

Indian town and country planning laws, which still primarily adhere to British-instituted practises, have not evolved much in the last 50 years.

Land use and regulatory control-based master plans, which are ineffective on their own for planning and managing cities, are nonetheless produced by cities.

Despite the many changes brought on by modernization, the tight segmentation of the city into various homogeneous zones, such as residential, commercial, and industrial, remains the emphasis of planning.

Environmental catastrophes are not catered for in the cities.

The creation, sanctioning, and implementation of master plans are all subject to lengthy delays.

They lack the authority to be integrated with other sector-specific infrastructure plans, most of which are still just wishlists.

Inter-agency discussions are still outside the purview of master planning.

They frequently approach cities with dynamic fine-grained systems and regional specificities in a static, generalised manner. They typically have a poor rate of implementation.

Moving ahead:

Indian cities should switch to adopting master plans as a regulatory control tool for creating a unified vision and outlining intended long-term results.

Every five years, strategic plans should be created to improve a city’s competitiveness and assist it in achieving its strategic objectives in terms of sustainability and economic development by highlighting the major initiatives that need to be carried out.

Local area plans should be created with public input to protect the health, safety, and welfare of the populace, contextualising local issues, demands, and goals while advancing the master plan’s overarching goals.

In order to establish strong connections between the urban and rural continuum, cities should also work to mainstream the use of spatialized social, economic, and environmental data.

Plans are not just about physical locations, but also about people.

Consensus-building about future growth and development is essential, with an emphasis on addressing climate change and integrating the economy and society.

What will contribute to the creation of a thriving, inclusive, and livable urban India is such a participatory process.