walling the city!

Why do we like to build huge walls around our spaces? Do we feel protected or rather do we feel in-secured with low walls around our houses. Here is a community open space under renovation and the compound walls are being constructed. As it is a work in progress site, the fencing is yet to happen. These photographs were captured this evening to demonstrate that people do like to sit on the edge. They feel safe and the low height walls do give them a sense of security. It is a rather interesting sitting area.

Community space compound wall under construction

 Why then are we busy constructing huge walls with jalis and other patterns and eventually increasing the heights? Ar. Satya Prakash notes that each independent house in bangalore constructs around 450 sq ft of walls just for compounding the site.

Huge compound walls protecting the buildings

People sitting on the edge of a community garden

Low walls to connect the building to the surroundings

Our perception of protection

Tall walls for protection

Crawford Market

       While providing designs for the Byculla college project in the early1870’s Kipling also worked extensively on sculptural plaques for the publicentrance to the Crawford Market which was named after the then municipalcommissioner of Bombay Arthur Travers Crawford. It was originally designed byarchitect Russell Aitken as a series of sheds for a good’s bazaar but a moreextensive scheme was ultimately considered necessary. Finally William Emersonsubmitted the winning proposal in a competition arranged by Crawford which wasfirst advertised in London. Still known familiarly as Crawford Market; theofficial name has now changed to honor Mahatma Jyotiba Phule.

An old photograph of Crawford Market

       So…. What does one remember while visiting Crawford Market? BritishIndia, old Bombay? Or what can be one’s perception towards looking at placelike this one? Therefore to understand the realm of such a great public spacein Mumbai, we conducted a study on Crawford Market which could give us a clearunderstanding as to why Crawford Market is a notable success till date. It islocated opposite the Mumbai police head-quarters, just north of the ChhatrapatiShivaji Terminus railway station, west of the J.J. fly-over and is at a walk able distance from CST.

       Bazaars, haats are authentic Indianconcepts which become integrated public spaces in the city of Mumbai andCrawford is definitely one of them. We started our study by simply strolling onthe streets of Crawford, understanding the streets, the people, the landscape,the architecture, etc. and the first thing that caught our attention was the128-foot high clock tower which advertised the entire market, adorned thecityscape and made an extremely effective focal point. Clear transformation inthe style of architecture was also observed, right from the 12^thcentury French Gothic style as described by Emerson the mastermind behind Crawford,to the art deco style of architecture.

Transformation

The fabric of the city is finely grained. Thebuilding promotes small blocks in close proximity, each varying in heights. Thestreet has got three major setups starting from the M.J.Phule Market, theCrawford Market and the Mangaldas market making the land use majorlycommercial. We also find mixed use of buildings and comparatively lessbuildings which were entirely residential. Public amenities like a police chowkopposite the Sheikh Memon Street and the Jama Masjid; an excellent example ofIslamic architecture is also found.

Open v/s Built

Building Use

Land Use

Gradually we started understandingcertain important elements which made it a great street one of which was theheights and proportions of the buildings as compared to the street. We noticedthat the (Sheikh Memon) street was in shadow almost the entire day. We understoodthat the buildings, their heights were all planned and constructed keeping inmind the sun path which increased the comfort zone  not only of the pedestrians but also thehawkers sitting, standing, and yelling along the by lanes of the street. Nextthing that was dominating the street was the hawker community hawking loudlythe prices of their products. As a whole they were advertising and invitingpeople to the lane making it noisy and chaotic.

Heights and Proportions

       A Streetis never complete without its people. They are people who make a street what ithas to be. Be it hawkers, be it residents of that area, be it consumers or beit pedestrians. Therefore we started understanding the tiny activities thatpeople were observed doing on the street. The percentage of people standing,sitting, bargaining, arguing, interacting, eating, drinking, etc. A majorpercentage of people visited the street as consumers. Interactions, conversations,bargaining happened amongst people who came to buy. A conversation, adiscussion, generally starts when there are open and public spaces, which arenot restricted for a class or a community of people. When people come together,though strangers they automatically tend to start a conversation or sometimeseven arrive at an inference. While Crawford Market is an integrative publicspace that caters to the needs of diverse class of people and is accessible toall, it did not seem to translate into a place where people could sit anddiscuss issues, be it personal or social and political. This is mainly because,Crawford Market is always busy and it apparently did not have sittable places. 

Street Corner Happenings

Another part of our study broughtus to the conclusion that people tend to sit where there is shade; irrespectiveof the size, kind or the comfort level of the space. All they require is shade.People in Crawford were observed sitting on an empty Mango crate, or on theplinth of a small shop, or even on the plinth of the footpath but all thesespaces were found in shade; of a tree of the roofs of shops, etc. Since it wasa long walk along the street we felt really hungry by noon. But even we urban researcherspreferred hogging on the street rather than cooling ourselves in an airconditioned restaurant. Yes street food works at Crawford. It provides a widevariety of food from spicy amalgamation snacks to cooling and refreshing juicesand friutplates. We observed people eating on the streets, looking at theactivities going around or simply gazing at the landscape of the street. Wealso mapped the density of sound, which was partly dependent on the trafficflow, and partly on the week days. We understood what kind of smell wasdominant in which area and how it affected the pedestrian circulation. Crawfordlacked landscape too. We found out that the trees were not complimenting thestreet and the people.

Trees

Landscape Mapping

Sound Mapping - Monday

Sound Mapping - Sunday

Smell Mapping

Color Mapping

Mapping Vehicular Movement

Mapping Pedestrian Movement

       Another important feature of the market is that there is order in chaos.Though the street hawkers made the lane noisy and chaotic, there was order inplaces like the Mangaldas Market or the Crawford market. The entire pedestriancirculation changes when one enters the Crawford Market or the MangaldasMarket. There are proper pathways that lead you to the shops, even the shopsare arranged on the smell or the king of shops. Everything so disciplinarily sorted out. But one cannot deny with the fact that it is because of the hawkersand the noise that they create that one feels safe and secured walking throughthe by lanes. Generally a by lane becomes dead and dark especially if it is aresidential area but it is a completely different picture at Crawford Market. Becauseof the mixed use of the buildings and again the street hawkers, there is activityfound till late night. These bring in more people on the street making it asafe place to walk on.

Shops and Informalities

Continuous Activity

        Our understanding of Crawford Market isthat it is a great bazaar with diverse people, variety of goods, plurality inactivities and the heart of the city of Mumbai. It has a history and a great storyof transformation and has evolved over a period of time. While we learn fromthis study the proportions that make a street work, the kind of architecturalelements that humanize a city and the blur between the formal and the informalit also forms a case for small urban interventions to deal with the increasing auto mobile traffic which was not quite anticipated several years ago. A conservativesurgery to keep the essence of this space intact with small urban insertions tokeep it from overcrowding by auto mobiles is the challenge that Crawford Market in particular and Mumbai in general presents today!       

Documenting Streets through Models

Street Models done by students

Understanding the age of the buildings through elevations - Sketch by Ashlesha

Grain Comparison - Marine Drive and Crawford Market - Sketch by Ashlesha

Comparative Abstract Sections of Crawfrod , Colaba Causeway and Marine Drive - Sketch by Ashlesha

Comparative Study of Marine Drive and Crawford Market

Colaba Causeway

Marine Drive

Horniman Circle

Crawford Market

Theoretical framework to analyse streets

“Think of a city and what comes to mind? Its streets. If a city’s streets look interesting, the city looks interesting; if they look dull, the city looks dull. There must be eyes on the street, eyes belonging to those we might call the natural proprietors of the street and the sidewalks must have users on it fairly continuously, both to add to the number of effective eyes on the street to watch the sidewalks in sufficient members” (Jacobs, 1965)

We would like to analyse the four streets under study through several theoretical frameworks which are as follows:

1. Jane Jacobs 
2. Henri leferbve
3. Kevin lynch
4. Margaret Crawford
5. Christopher Alexander
6. David Harvey
7. Paul de Sperigon
8. Mike Davis
9. Yatin Pandya
10. Himanshu Burte
11. Ash Amin
12. K.T. Ravindran
13. Bimal Patel
14. Rameshwar

'By Urban Revolution, I refer to transformations that affect contemporary society, ranging from the period when questions of growth and industrialisation predominate to the period when the urban problematic becomes predominant, when the search for solutions and modalities unique to urban society are foremost'- Henri Leferbve 

Jane Jacobs looks at a city through several parameters like the grain of the fabric, size of the block, the need for aged buildings, mix of land use.

"Flourishing diversity anywhere in a city means the mingling of high yield, middling yield, low yield and no yield enterprises"( Jacobs, 1961)

"On successful city streets, people must appear at different times. This is time considered on small  scale, hour by hour through the day" (Jacobs,1961). 

  

On the Streets!

We started our walk from CST Station which was earlier known as the Victoria terminus. It is the first railway station in India built by the British in the 1850's. We took up 4 streets for study which are the Crawford market, the town hall until flora fountain, colaba causeway and Marine drive.

At the C.S.T Station

The Crawford Group - Headed by Sadiya

At M'cDonalds, Colaba - Lessons on mapping

Asiatic Library 

Asiatic Library - Ashlesha instructing the students

Hawkers at CST

Sketch by Pranay ( Crawford Market)

A student capturing Marine Drive

Harsh Afternoon at Marine Drive

Colaba Causeway

Central Park!

Me and Ashlesha decided to spend some time at the central Park this evening to understand more about the social logic of open spaces in our city. Central Park is a city level open space in the new town of Navi Mumbai. It is placed in Kharghar next to a Krishna temple ( ISKON) and opposite to the Golf course. Our first observations of course were that it is gated and has no entry fee. And yes we had a baloonwala and the bhelpuriwala right there thus retaining the informality! It has an expansive parking area. Today being a holiday it was filled with people of all ages, kids and adults all alike enjoying being in this vast open space. 

So back to our question, What makes a public space successful in this city? Is it the scale? Is it the amenities, like parking, public toilets? Is it the natural settings? Or is it the mere existence of a city level open space? One thing about the city and the country is that we are full of people and we like being in the open. Be it a tobacco shop, a small tea corner, a community garden next to the house or a city level public space, we are full of people. This does not stop us from appreciating the goodness of the park. It is indeed an interesting place to be with an impressive amphi theater, play area for kids with innovative play equipment  good air and brightly lit as the sun sets. 

Comparing Central Park to several parks and open spaces in cities across India like Bhopal and Hyderabad; we realize that there have been constant efforts to create good public spaces across the country. The problem is as time passes, it becomes hard to maintain. Is it the economics or lack of interest. We don't know! Be it the lumbini Park or the lake side at Bhopal, why do places lose the dynamism they posses. Why go that far? What happened to Sagar Vihar and Sarovar Vihar. These were once beautiful edges of the city. 

So is the success of a public space really a design issue, a social issue or a political issue? We are still wondering? What really makes a public space successful?