Resilient Development Models for Rapidly Urbanising Industrial Cities

In contemporary India, rapid growth in the manufacturing sector is coinciding with post-fordist means of production, whereby, to compete with the global industry, plants and machinery are becoming increasingly labour extensive and automated. However, these do not prevent industrial zones from nucleating urban growth or attracting migrants from far-off regions. Kalinganagar is one such upcoming city in the mineral rich belt of Odisha in eastern India, meticulously planned at the cross-flows of raw materials for steel making, supported by road, rail, and water based transportation infrastructure.

The projection of the city’s growth and planning for the living and working environments of its future citizens needs to consider various dynamics ranging from local to global contexts, such as the instigation of allied industries and services, or the spawning of parallel, informal activities in the absence of adequate employment opportunities. Failure to do so results in the emergence of socio-economically segregated and unregulated developments, responding to which, various urban actors – individuals, corporations, government bodies –devise piece-meal solutions that are rarely coordinated. In brief, this not only affects the well being of the inhabitants and poses hazards to the environment, but the rigidity and fragility of the urban patterns become a hinderance to the growth and productivity of the industrial nuclei.

This research in association with the Material Systems Lab and the Urban Risk Lab seeks to propose planning and development frameworks for the emerging industrial, urban region, combining predictive models for the industrial growth with normative models for urban development, to enable robust & resilient design typologies for the city through coordinated efforts of the public & private sectors