Harvard Architect Plans Green City in Pakistan

Work started today to build a 21st Century eco-friendly model city about 50 km north east of downtown Karachi, Pakistan.

Named DHA City Karachi or DCK, the project has been planned by Doxiadis and Osmani Associates along with Professor Spiro Pollalis as its chief planner on an 11,640 acre rural site. Constantine Doxiadis (1914-1975) was a Greek architect and urban planner who planned Pakistan's capital Islamabad and several Karachi communities, including Korangi, Landhi and New Karachi, in 1960s. Pollalis, also of Greek ancestry, is a professor of design, technology and management at the Harvard Design School in Cambridge, Mass.



The DCK masterplan envisions a self-contained sustainable city with 50,000 residential and commercial lots, healthcare and education facilities, theme parks, a convention center, informal and formal sports and recreational facilities and resorts, retail and restaurants, along with all necessary community facilities such as theaters and civic centers.

At the heart of the new city lies the City Gateway and Downtown district that house the Central Business, Culture & Arts, Education, Central Market and Mixed-use Sub Districts. Careful consideration has been given to the distribution of land uses within this area in order to provide a vital economic and cultural heart that will support the city as it grows.

The downtown district will be defined by an automobile-free pedestrian zone with tree-lined walking paths, landscaping, water features, and piazza’s. The idea is to encourage pedestrian movement to improve the quality of life for the downtown employees, visitors and residents. An efficient public transportation system will help support this.

Based on the latest research done under Zofnass Program for Sustainable Infrastructure at Harvard University's Graduate School of Design, sustainable design principles have been implemented across the entire community. A strategy has been used to maintain the ecological integrity of the site through the preservation and incorporation of prominent natural features that are integrated as creeks, green fingers and wind corridors, according to e-architect.com.

There's great emphasis on energy, waste and water management throughout the plan. There will be passive cooling and shades to reduce the need for air-conditioning in summers, extensive use of renewable energy from wind, solar and biomass, and energy-efficient LED lighting. There will be storm water collection through natural drains into lakes, and the community bylaws will require waste recycling as well as the use of grey water to irrigate drought-resistant native plants and shrubs.

DCK is an ambitious but necessary effort to promote eco-friendly and sustainable urban development as Pakistan undergoes rapid urbanization. But the past experience has shown that the actual implementation of such a plan will be quite challenging without the cooperation of its residents.

An even bigger challenge is the uncontrolled expansion of big cities like Karachi which are drawing more and more rural migrants every day without building appropriate new low-cost legal housing and infrastructure for them. The result is the mushroom growth of illegal settlements created by unscrupulous land-grabbing politicians and their cronies who profit from it. In the absence of official urban planning to settle migrant laborers, a burgeoning informal industry has emerged to fill the vacuum to build what are described as "Self-service Levittowns" by an American journalist Steve Inskeep in his 2011 book about Karachi titled "Instant City". With the active connivance of corrupt local police and other government officials and protected by politicians, the so-called "land mafias" grab and sell large swathes of vacant government land, subdivide it into plots, build shoddy roads and pilfered service connections for gas, water and electricity.

Here's how Inskeep describes one such illegal settlement in areas opened up and made accessible by a new expressway called "Northern Bypass":

"My driver steered the car to a section known as Tasier Town, which stood within a couple of miles of the new highway. It was in the farther northeastern reaches of the city, a bit farther than Doxoiadis's "ruined" old suburb in North Karachi. We stopped in a settled area to ask directions, and were pointed down a two-lane road. A market appeared to the right. A wide expanse of land stretched off to the left. Someone had posted a little sign on a little roadside building there, 2007 order from the High Court of Sindh directing that nothing should be built on that property. Behind it, on the vacant land, we saw homes under construction.....The local Home Depot was called a thalla, and Wahab, the boss of it, was thallawala. Like his workers-a so many newcomers to Karachi-he was a Pashtun from Pakistan's war-torn far northwest. On his lot, he sold most of the basic materials to make a simple house. Concrete blocks and roofing materials were cheap. Human beings were even cheaper. Wahab's laborers lived under a thatched roof near the concrete mixer.

Wahab said that there were certain expenses. Police sometimes came by and declared themselves to be shocked-shocked-that illegal construction was underway. The cops could not possibly overlook such an obvious violation unless they were paid.......I said goodbye to Wahab and went back into the illegal development, along narrow and straight dirt lane. Little ridges of dirt marked out the future home lots on either side. I chatted with several men who were laying PVC pipe in a trench, building a sewer line that would dump into the seasonal stream....Who was paying the men to dig the sewers? "A rich man", was all one said."


While Defense Housing Association (DHA) is known for developing upscale communities in major cities, Pakistani military governments have also taken low-cost initiatives to house the poor beginning with the urban planning and development of Landhi, Korangi and New Karachi in 1960s. Unfortunately, there has been little interest on a similar scale by the civilian governments to follow through on their promises of roti, kapra aur makan (food, clothing and shelter) for the poor.

Even though boosting legal housing construction in planned communities offers tremendous potential to stimulate and grow the formal economy, it is not being taken seriously today. It's much more lucrative for the politicians and bureaucrats to continue the current system of illegal settlements.



While critics jump at every opportunity to lambaste the Pakistani military for its various business enterprises, they pay no attention to the fact that Pakistan's economy has also been managed significantly better under military rule. It's not just the venality of the politicians, but also their gross incompetence that gets in the way. One need only look at the differences between Cantonments and civilian communities in South Asia to get a sense of who provides more competent governance.

Prof Anatol Lieven in his book "Pakistan: A Hard Country", describes Pakistan Army as follows:

"For the military, the image of paradise is the cantonment, with its clean, swept, neatly signposted streets dotted with antique, gleaming artillery pieces, and shaded trees....In the poorer parts of Pakistan, the contrast with civilian institutions-including those of government-is that between developed and the barely developed worlds....In the military headquarters, every staff officer has a computer. In the government offices, most ministers do not (and in many cases would not know how to use it if they did). "

British legacy of competence lives on in the Indian military as well. Here's a similar excerpt from a piece by Indian journalist Vir Sanghvi describing Indian military:

".... the (Indian) army sometimes appears to live in a state within a state. Visit a cantonment and you will be struck by the contrast with the civilian part of the town or city where it is located. The roads will be broad and well-maintained, the buildings will be freshly painted, the surroundings will be clean, and an air of good manners and civility will prevail. Visit an army town (Wellington, for instance) and the contrast will be even more striking. The order and cleanliness of the cantonments serves as a contrast to the chaos and filth of modern India."

I welcome the DCK plan with the hope that the green city will serve as a model for the 21st century and inspire private-sector developers to build similar project in the future.

Here's a video describing the project:



Related Links:

Haq's Musings

Housing Construction & Economy in Pakistan

Emaar Crescent Bay Project in Karachi

Pakistan Military Starts Manufacturing Tablet PCs

Military's Role in Pakistan's Industrialization

Pakistan's Demographic Dividend

Pakistan's Defense Industry Goes High-Tech

Pakistan Launches UAV Production Line at Kamra

DHA City Karachi Report

Incompetence Worse Than Corruption

Food, Clothing & Shelter for All

Comments

Riaz Haq said…
Here's a Daily Beast article on Bahria Town gated communities in Pakistan:

This unlikely playground for wealthy Muslims is the vision of Khan's boss and father-in-law, Malik Riaz Hussain, a 59-year-old billionaire Pakistani contractor. Set between the capital Islamabad and its sister city Rawalpindi, Bahria Town is the "masterpiece" of his 40-year career, a $6 billion project he has funded solo to avoid having to deal with outside investors. Its nine phases, too vast to fully appreciate without standing on one of the plateaus that overlook them, will one day mesh together into a planned residential city for 1 million people. The project broke ground in 1996, and already, many of the 50,000 luxury properties in the development are owned by wealthy Pakistan expatriates who swooped into Bahria Town after 9/11 to buy second homes amid fears they would be driven out of places like London, New York and Los Angeles. Equally important was the security and serenity that Bahria Town provides, which drew Pakistan expats and a smattering of wealthy Arab Muslims away from places like Dubai.

The complex offers amenities (24-hour armed security, schools, hospitals, a fire department, retail shopping, restaurants and entertainment centers) that go above and beyond those in many of the gated communities that have become so popular in countries from the United States to Brazil. Given the nation's security issues, it's especially easy to understand why the rich here want to cloister themselves. Rival Pakistani developers, including one owned by the military, have begun copying Hussain's vision, constructing their own gated communities in the suburbs of major Pakistani cities such as Karachi. Hussain himself is developing a second such site in Lahore, where former prime minister Nawaz Sharif already lives in a gated community called Model Town.

Hussain's original inspiration for the mega-community came from the pre-planned town of Reston, Virginia, just outside Washington, D.C. Materials and design inspiration have been imported from everywhere. In the center of roundabouts sit giant Spanish fountains costing $500,000 a pop; the main streets are lined with palm trees brought in from Thailand; grass for the local golf course comes from the U.S. state of Georgia; the education expert for the 1,100-acre university being built is from Seattle. "When I see America, when I see Britain, when I see Turkey, when I see Malaysia," Hussain says, "the only thing I think is, 'Why not Pakistan?' "

This is Hussain's key notion—that Bahria Town is a world away from Taliban and Qaeda militants, the assassination of Benazir Bhutto and weekly suicide bombings. "This is the real Pakistan," Hussain told NEWSWEEK.


http://www.thedailybeast.com/newsweek/2008/02/23/safe-behind-their-walls.html
Riaz Haq said…
#Pakistan's barefoot architect Yasmeen Lari is developing agile #construction techniques for low cost, zero carbon and zero waste #housing with materials like bamboo, mud and lime and testing her prototype on a shaking table at NED University in #Karachi. https://www.theguardian.com/artanddesign/2020/apr/01/yasmeen-lari-pakistan-architect-first-female-jane-drew?CMP=share_btn_tw

A mirrored glass ziggurat stands on a corner in central Karachi, flanked by a pair of polished granite towers. Golden bubble elevators glide up and down behind the tinted windows, shuttling oil executives to their offices through the sparkling five-storey atrium. The Pakistan State Oil House is a power-dressed monument to the petroleum-fuelled excesses of the early 1990s, oozing ostentation from every gilded surface – so it comes as a surprise to learn that its architect is now building mud huts for the poor.

“I feel like I am atoning for some of what I did,” says Yasmeen Lari with an embarrassed chuckle. “I was a ‘starchitect’ for 36 years, but then my egotistical journey had to come to an end. It’s not only the right of the elite to have good design.”

The 79-year-old architect was awarded the prestigious Jane Drew prize in London in March, a gong that recognises women’s contribution to architecture, for her tireless humanitarian work over the last two decades. She joins an illustrious cast of previous winners, including Zaha Hadid, Denise Scott Brown and Liz Diller, but her career has been like no other, moving from glitzy corporate monuments to shelters built with the barest minimum of means.

------------
While international aid agencies busied themselves erecting costly prefab housing with concrete and galvanised iron sheets, Lari worked with dispossessed families to rebuild their homes using mud, stone, lime and wood from the surrounding debris. Working with volunteers, she trained local people how to use whatever materials were to hand to rebuild in a better, safer way.

“I think we often misunderstand what kind of help is needed,” she says. “As an outsider, you do things that you think are appropriate, but the reality here is different. The aid mindset is to think of everyone as helpless victims who need things done for them, but we have to help people to do things for themselves. There’s so much that can be done with what’s already there, using 10 times less money.”

She says that the process of co-creation can also be a crucial part of healing. “Disasters can be truly devastating and people easily fall into deep depression. But if you give them something to do, it really helps with recovery. Something people have helped to make is much more valued than something simply given.”

Since 2005, a sequence of further earthquakes, floods and conflicts have kept Lari and her team at the Heritage Foundation on their toes, developing agile techniques with bamboo, mud and lime, always following the principles of low cost, zero carbon and zero waste. Severe flooding in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa and Sindh provinces in 2010 saw them develop a design for modular community centres raised on stilts, which safely survived more floods a couple of years later.

When earthquakes hit Balochistan province in 2013 and Shangla in 2015, Lari designed shelters using a cross-braced bamboo framework, learned from the vernacular dhijji technique. Testing the prototype on a shaking table at NED University in Karachi, they found the structure was capable of withstanding an earthquake more than six times the strength of the 1995 Kobe disaster. If the homes ever did begin to crumble, they could be easily rebuilt using the same organic materials – unlike their concrete and steel counterparts.
Riaz Haq said…
Doxiadis in #Pakistan: #Greek #architect and town planner Constantinos Doxiadis played a significant role in the #urbanplanning & development of the nascent state of Pakistan in the 1960s and master plan for #Karachi & #Islamabad | Online | November 16 http://www.ekathimerini.com/258964

University of the Arts London PhD researcher and British School at Athens resident Syma Tariq will deliver an online lecture on the role of Greek architect and town planner Constantinos Doxiadis in the urban development of the nascent state of Pakistan in the 1960s and master plan for the capital, Islamabad. “Dreaming of Entopia: Constantinos Doxiadis in Pakistan,” starts on Zoom at 7 p.m. Greek time. For details and registration, visit bsa.ac.uk.


Riaz Haq said…
Land Grab or River Revival? Inside Pakistan’s $7 Billion ‘Green’ City
The government wants to spend $7 billion to develop the Ravi riverbank, but opponents say that risks replicating the environmental and societal problems in nearby Lahore.

https://www.bloomberg.com/news/features/2022-01-19/pakistan-s-plan-to-build-a-green-city-to-save-a-river

Warraich is among dozens of landowners petitioning against the government's plan to build a megacity from scratch on the banks of the Ravi river, a once-thriving waterway that’s been depleted by pollution and dwindling water levels. The $7-billion endeavor would span 46 kilometers (29 miles) and include housing, commercial areas, hospitals and schools — creating a metropolis that could ease pressure on overpopulated Lahore and support its urbanization.

The Ravi Urban Development Authority, a government body created to manage the project, pitches it as a green initiative that will bring in much-needed resources to clean up the river. “The idea is to manage the area properly,” says RUDA’s Chief Executive Officer Imran Amin.

RUDA aims to build a man-made channel and a series of barrages along the Ravi’s path to control its water level, which the authority says will help conserve what limited flow remains and restore Lahore’s supply of groundwater. But some opponents are skeptical of those claims and what they see as a land grab by RUDA. The city’s high court halted the project last year — one ruling in an ongoing legal fight for the future of the river that could reach Pakistan’s Supreme Court.

“This is our property. We don’t want to sell it,” says Warraich, sitting on a white plastic armchair outside his farmhouse. “They are acquiring our land for a new city” where local residents won’t be able to continue farming, he says. “I don’t understand this logic.”

Pakistan’s leaders have been trying to develop the banks of the Ravi for almost a decade and Prime Minister Imran Khan has made the task a priority.

The Ravi river was instrumental to Lahore’s development, but today large pockets sit stagnant while other sections have dried up completely. A water-sharing treaty with India has limited its flow, while Pakistan’s own mismanagement has exacerbated the problem. For decades, the river has collected untreated sewage from Lahore, as well as industrial and agricultural waste.

In recent years, Pakistan has developed legislation to regulate water use amid warnings that the country will face water scarcity by 2025. According to a government study last year, only 39 percent of water sources across 29 cities were safe for drinking. Cleaning up the Ravi could help Pakistan forestall an impending water crisis — its basin is home to some 50 million people and the river irrigates about 7 million acres of land.

These short-term solutions, however, will run up against the climate clock. Most of Pakistan's rivers are fed by melting snow from glaciers in the Himalayas, which are set to shrink as the world heats up. As global average temperatures rise beyond 2 degrees Celsius — a highly likely scenario based on current trajectories — the volume of Himalayan glaciers will be halved.

Global warming is set to increase precipitation across Pakistan, but climate models show the seasonality and intensity of those rains will become less predictable. That's bad news for farmers given the vast majority of crops grown in Pakistan are dependent on reliable monsoon patterns. Though agriculture provides less than 20 percent of the country's gross domestic product, it employs 40 percent of its labor force.

Pakistan isn’t the first country to try and solve its environmental issues with more development. Governments have plowed billions of dollars into eco-city initiatives everywhere from Malaysia to Iceland to simultaneously boost economic growth and adapt to a warming planet. The projects are marked by common features including more efficient public transport, green spaces and wastewater treatment plants,” says Amin.

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