'The best solutions are often simple'

You speak of 'sustainable city strategies' for developing countries...
Sustainable development is built on the inter-linkages between land, roads, water supply, sanitation, housing and building technologies. All the answers we need for today's city planning are rooted in our traditional planning systems. For instance: the land chosen to build upon today is inappropriate...

Could you elaborate on the 'selection of land' aspect?
It is a general misconception that flat land is more economical to build on, as compared to gradient land. Absurd! Our ancient cities were generally built on high land, at a certain distance from the river. Take any city for instance: Tughlaqabad, Fatehpur Sikri, Jaisalmer or Jodhpur. They were all built on elevated land. The wastewater of the settlement would travel along the slope. This allows for absorption, resulting in groundwater recharge.

But you don't get flat land or elevated land everywhere?
True, but at least build on the elevated parts of the land available. In reality, there is no flat land. Architects and planners make it flat, and compound our problems.

Take our roads and drainage, for example. It's the largest single contradiction in contemporary planning methodologies. Simple logic tells usthat roads need minimum slope.Drainage, on the other hand needsmaximum slope. Why then do we line roads and drains side-by-side? It isevident that the simpler solution is to de-link the two. Once this is done, we can then plan accordingly.

But the drainage and sanitation systems in a city are closely linked, aren't they?
Even with the existing sanitation system, we make a mistake at the very beginning. The first step is to separate kitchen and bath wastewater from the water closet (wc) discharge. Our kitchen and bath wastewater typically contains food residue, grease, dirt and soap as the main impurities. At present, they are sent via long pipelines to sewage treatment plants, which is unnecessary. This effluent can be locally discharged into broad-leafed plantations, such as banana and papaya trees, which are excellent digesters of grease. Grease, in fact, works as a nutrient for these trees! The remaining water percolates and recharges the groundwater. Another solution can be to utilise the brick-lined stormwater drains, which at present are used only for the two monsoon months in a year. Soil is a giant filter; its depth and size obviously make it a very efficient filter!

So planners haven't really understood the hydrological cycle (water in relation to the natural terrain) in cities?
There is ample water to meet our needs, so long as we understand the hydrological cycle, and learn to utilise it effectively. Planning is all about small details that should be established at the local level.

For example?
Take precipitation. One of the vital issues in water supply is also interlinked with land use and land development. These days, the ruling wisdom is to fill up the vacant areas with concrete. Say, the large parking lots that have become the norm. The rainwater falling on these concrete areas never gets a chance to enter the soil, and the stormwater drains are hopelessly blocked. It follows that floods in urban areas are a frequent occurrence. Cities have hardly any topsoil that can retain moisture and keep the hydrological cycle going. One solution is latticed blocks that make it possible for grass to grow in the cavities and for the soil to absorb moisture. But, for a really dramatic solution to our water problems, we need to look elsewhere.

Where?
The toilet! We must re-examine the cistern. Every use drains out 12 litres of precious domestic water. Did you know that today's toilet cistern continues to be built to specifications over a hundred years old! No one looked at why so much water is used. Twelve litres of water were drained out to send stale news down the pipes, because in those days, the British used old newspaper as toilet paper!

So, how much water is required?
A 50 per cent cut: six litres is enough. Our water problems can be ascribed to the fact that we don't evaluate our systems at their fundamental level. The inter-linkages between appropriate technologies and systems need to be comprehended, and woven around the city's development.

What about environmental degradation caused by the building industry?
The building industry is the largest consumer of resources and accounts for 50 per cent of the gross national product (gnp) of most nations. Misuse and incorrect choice of building materials are the crucial factors that cause environmental degradation.

Why, incorrect choice of materials and misuse?
To start with, standardising the size of brick at 3x4.5x9 inches for the entire country is a royal British mistake. Clay varies from region to region, and in standardising burnt clay brick, we attempt to standardise the quality of clay, which is clearly not possible! A logical option is to use bricks in their varied sizes depending on the region and the quality of clay. Besides this, the strength imparted to the brick is not a direct consequence of the strength required. The process is, in fact, aimed at the surface requirement of non-erodability.

What about reinforced cement concrete (rcc); how is it misused?
rcc is the second-most popular building material in the industry. Although rcc is a good invention, it has been misused. rcc has a rough surface, and this has led to a tremendous growth in the production of surface materials in the last century. And most of these surface materials consume a high amount of energy at the production level. At present, about 30 per cent of the construction industry comprises only walling materials.

Basically, rcc uses cement as an adhesive to bind a mixture of sand and stone, to get back the strength of the stone, which was crushed in the first place. Concrete as a material is excellent in compression (say, when you lay one on top of the other). However, rcc is often introduced flat (say, as roofing material), causing it to sag. Steel is, therefore, added to reinforce the material.

So, where does the solution lie?
Development in this area has so far centred around stronger walls, while logically, the important requirement is that the surface of the wall should be resilient and non-erodable. This is the fundamental concept of surface engineering. Basically, once the surface provides for a non-erodable skin, the remainder body of the block could be made of lean concrete fly ash or even mud. A surface engineering product provides the integration of the architect, engineer, artist and the artisan.

Why have we not developed appropriate building materials?
Essentially, we have fallen into the trap of using standard details for walls, roofs and foundations. Each generation of architects and builders mindlessly adopts the existing norms without examining alternative solutions. In fact, only an extremely small percentage of architects are actually involved in research and development of alternative technology and building materials today.

Today, 'appropriate technologies' or 'alternate systems of planning for sustainable development' have become clichs. And this is where the irony lies: what I work at is not an 'alternative', but the very basic, technology. What is commonly used today, in fact, is what qualifies as an alternative. And this is where the problem lies. The crux of the matter is that every action is best performedat the lowest level that it can be performed.

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