Mumbai - a transforming gaothan!

Urban Landscapes is an elective offered by Ashlesha Kale and Sameera Rao at D.Y. Patil College of Architecture to 4th year students. The elective class in Urban Landscapes took off with the study of Bandra Station Precinct. Although as the study got deeper the whole of Bandra is being studied to understand its evolution, transformation and shift from being the queen of suburbs to that of chocked roads, taller buildings and soaring real estate prices.

Discussion in the class

Bandra has evolved from a collection of several small villages to a residential adress of glamour, entertainment and stardom. Bandra has the unique distinction of having 5 churches and the Basillica of the our lady of the Mount. With Bandra Kurla Complex becoming the new business hub of the city, the older generation cannot quite visualize this ever changing image of Bandra.

Mapping Land use

Understanding Bandra Through evolution and several other layers

Mumbai is a walkable city, a city of intermodal transport systems and a city where only 5 % people use private automobiles. With all stations demonstrating intermodal transportation, this image of where the train stops, the bus starts and when the bus stops, there is a cab or an auto waiting is very obvious at Bandra Station. Standing in the foreground of the splendid colonial Bandra station, one can notice the trains, the buses and the autos all moving at the same level which is a model that several countries are striving for today. On the contrary, in the background of the station is the unending skywalk that takes off at the kalanagar station and lands at the Bandra talao. This skywalk runs mostly empty yet has been repeated in several parts of the city.

Bandra Station ( West Side)

Colonial Bandra!

The legendary skywalk!

The built and the unbuilt!

Empty skywalks unmanageable streets

Waiting for the interchange!

Bandra talao which was once known as the pink lake is highly polluted and almost unused today.The restoration plans for Bandra lake talk about having musical fountains, improved sidewalks, flashy lights and other features to make this a city level public place for youngsters aspiring the landscapes of the west. Most of the people living in the low rise and mid rise are tenants as the owners have all moved out of their houses eagerly waiting for the redevelopment plans to take shape. Thus the character of Bandra as a suburb that had its ancestral origins in the Portuguese, the Marathas and the British is seen slowing dissolving in the sea of the redevelopment plans. And the vision of all redevelopment plans is undoubtedly to create a world class city with world class amenities.

along the lake

While this story is not unique to Bandra it is really a story of the commons. The wait for redevelopment of houses with a slightly increased FSI and unattended public spaces also desperately awaiting restoration programs to meet the aspirations of our foreign returned youth is the plight of the streets and neighborhoods of the suburbs of Mumbai! Thus, a gaothan under constant threat to redevelopment is a metaphor to the city of Mumbai!

the old and the new!