Archives - Question of Cities

‘Waste pickers are treated like step-children but the formal sector can’t work without them’

Most of Bengaluru’s waste used to be dumped in the villages nearby and waste pickers invisibilised despite their critical role. Hasiru Dala has been working to organise them, get government identity cards for them, and make them stakeholders in the…

Building bridges: Why it need not be street vendors versus cities

Though a cityscape is nothing without its street vendors and they are an integral part of a city’s economy providing many services to people across class, they are unwelcome. Its system views them as encroachers while people believe they are…

They woke us up to climate change, and an equitable world

Over the past decades, multilateral agencies and international organisations drew forces together to conduct studies that led to path-breaking reports on environment and development, brought world leaders together to agree on cutting emissions, and laid down the goals and framework…

The spectacular failure of planning cities, as we know it. What next?

The widely-prevalent conventional urban planning framework in India, focused on land use, zoning and building regulations, is out of step with the demands of the time we live in, especially climate change events. Development Plans or Master Plans approach natural…

How people reimagined the practice of public spaces in Delhi

Over decades, democratic protests have moved locations from the old city to the Boat Club and, more recently, to Jantar Mantar and Ramlila Ground. In every location, people agitating for their causes and articulating their demands from governments, turned non-protest…

Redesign: The key to the Gordian knot of Mumbai’s congested and unsafe places

The city’s landscape has been constantly changing but what has remained consistent over the years is the chaotic cluttered mess outside its suburban railway stations used by millions of people every day and unsafe lanes at key locations. Redesigning some…

‘Keep environmental justice at the core, not mere environmentalism’

India’s economic growth model, which is based on passing costs to the poor and marginalised while the benefits are for another class of people, makes environmental justice urgent. Environmental issues are seen as problems to be solved with technological interventions,…

How bold urban designs are changing our relationship with cities

As cities develop, streets and public spaces are built to give more room to an increasing number of vehicles. In the process, these spaces lose their people-centric character, disconnecting residents from their cities. Some cities around the world have broken…

We, the people, must fight to save our cities and ourselves

Governments and authorities are the custodians of our ecology but, in the past few years, people have resisted and protested actions of their governments to save trees, forests, hills, rivers, creeks, seafronts, wetlands and more. While the prevailing urban development…

Jal Satyagraha: From water conversations to water conservation and justice

Drawn from the ‘swaraj through satyagraha’ concept of India’s independence movement, the struggle for water access and equity has spread across rural India. It’s time for Jal Satyagraha to take shape in cities too given the water crises, top-down water…