'A city cant grow in conflict with nature'

There is no gainsaying that urban sprawl — unplanned, uncontrolled spreading of urban development into the rural areas — around Chennai is the root cause for the recent deluge that brought in its wake disaster, destruction and death. Unscrupulous elements and property sharks moved to the rural outskirts of the city and grabbed agricultural, watershed and low-lying land of all shapes and sizes in the ‘ecologically-sensitive areas’. 

Chennai Master Plan-2026 was notified in 2008 wherein most of the rural/farm lands in Chennai Metropolitan Area (CMA) were declared as ‘urbanisable’ allowing construction activities for all purposes. However, Development Regulations (DR) prohibited construction in sites near a water body or a water course likely to be contaminated by the proposed development; in sites likely to be inundated where proper drainage is not possible and in sites that are filled up tanks, low-lying or made up of soil by depositing rubbish or offensive matters seeping into the sub-soil water. But these ‘prohibitions’ have been observed more in violation than in compliance due to the indiscriminate and arbitrary practice of land-use change/reclassification. 

Master Plan also declared several areas as “ecologically-sensitive” prohibiting any kind of construction activities there. These include the Coastal Regulation Zone (CRZ) notified by Government of India under the Environment Protection Act, 1986; the Aquifer recharge areas; Catchment area of lakes; Pallikaranai Swamp; Natural hazard prone areas and green belt along Poonamallee Bye-pass and Redhills Bye-pass roads. 

Following-up the Master Plan, at the initiative of the Corporation of Chennai ‘Revised Chennai City Development Plan’ (CDP) was prepared in 2009. It suggested rehabilitation of the city’s waterways to ward off threat of floods to the city of Chennai. The purpose of the plan was to guide development of the CMA through the year 2026 and to make Chennai a prime metropolis “which will become more liveable, economically vibrant, environmentally sustainable and with better assets for the future generations”. 

CDP identified the ‘ecologically-sensitive’ areas of CMA and suggested a macro-growth strategy to protect critical environmental assets and discourage urban sprawl. It recommended nil construction in waterways, water bodies, rivers and marshes, low-rise-low density construction in adjacent lands and medium to high-rise-high-density construction at other places. As solution to ‘demographic pressures’ CDP suggested sustainable ‘neighbourhood development’ and satellite townships with well designed transport corridors to the city. 

This Plan was not even acknowledged. Eco-sensitive areas were crowded with rampant construction spearheaded by govt. — state and centre. Instances are Chennai Airport on the floodplains of Adyar, Elevated Expressway from Madras Port to Maduravoil over the Cooum River, a natural drain; Mass Rapid Transport System, above Buckingham Canal, the longest man-made drain; a highway with IT sky-scrappers splitting the vast marshland of Pallikaranai and high-rise buildings in the swamps of Thuraipakkom and Perumbakkom for re-locating slum dwellers. 

As to private development, Phoenix Mall, the largest in the metropolis, sits on the Velachery lake-bed. Multi-specialty MIOT Hospital is perched on the banks of Adyar river. Global Hospital is in the low-lying paddy fields. Large engineering, medical colleges and private universities have come up on marshes, water bodies or floodplains. The posh high-rise MRC Nagar has shot-up on the prohibited CRZ near the high-tide line and the estuary of the Adyar. Result is the choking of nature’s ‘Right-of-Way’ and storage for the rain water — rivers, rivulets, lakes, ponds, marshes, wetlands. Hence the deluge. 

CMDA’s claim of ensuring valid title and not allowing construction in ‘no-construction’ zones is untenable. Similar is CMDA’s post-deluge direction to builders to “submit building plans with detailed blueprints to flush out excess water from their compound to a common public drain channel connected to the nearby river”. Will CMDA continue to allow construction in watersheds and marshes if the builder submits a farcical ‘flush-out-blueprint’? 

A city cannot grow in conflict with nature. What is urgently needed is serious re-examined at the Master Plan, DR and adoption of the nature-friendly master-growth strategy suggested in the Revised CDP. To start with land-use change/ reclassification should be halted, major review needs to be done and stringent regulations should be in place. At least now Institute of Town Planners and Confederation of Real Estate Developers would play a constructive role in sustainable urban development!