RE-Thinking RE-Development: Urban Ecology, Green and Blue Infrastructure & Human Centered Design As a Guiding Factor for the Urban Development: A Case of Sarojni Nagar, New Delhi (India)

Richa Raje (Department of Landscape Architecture)

The urban development discourse contains strong disagreement about how to deal re-development models, while responding to shifting commercial demands. This contribution discusses how a response to this re-development question can be achieved, through design intent for Sarojini Nagar.

The capital city New Delhi ranks highest being the most polluted mega-city of the world and suffering from various environmental problems. Sarojini Nagar, a government housing, informal market which makes it a unique social space of the city. The site has 4500 trees, is surrounded by drain channel and ridge. Looking at it's commercial value and location merits, a higher urban density is envisioned by government for redevelopment of the public land that would directly lead to tree felling, destructing its public and social identity & further accentuation of urban environmental issues. An alternative design approach is critically required for such dense redevelopment projects.

Analysis overlay of various urban and ecological layers forms basis to site interpretations and it's carrying capacity. Best practices from Landscape & Urban Design domain were used to inform the design as evidence-based strategies.

In the complex Indian scenario, design attempts to resolve the issues of traffic, by creating a dominantly pedestrian environment, strategic car parks and furthermore gives primacy to people on vibrant streets. The present-day development needs to have a sense of identity to anchor with its open & built spaces. The proposal, hence integrates the native trees, re-imagines the built-grid and invites the idea of nature in a strong and convincing manner. The design attempts for a hierarchy of well-knit open spaces that creates a sense of place & belonging to the users.

Several design iterations were done at master planning stage so that development acts as an approach towards attaining a mid-ground between creating compact urban infrastructure and sustaining ecology as potential living spaces.