In 2022, we should look to complete the phrase with something other than “...two steps back”. It has not been an easy year on both the health and environment fronts across the world. Cities, which are the economic centres of the country, have been hit hard by the pandemic. The silver lining has been our ability to produce a vaccine quickly enough to begin a recovery. However, we aren’t out of the quagmire yet.
What we forgot during the pandemic was the global climate change comet hurtling towards us. While most people put their heads together in fighting the pandemic, some citizens like the Relief Riders of Bengaluru decided to take on both climate change and pandemic head on by delivering relief supplies locally on bicycles across 13 cities, saving tonnes of emissions and helping thousands of people at the same time. It has led to them being nominated for the 2022 Nobel Peace Prize.
There is a model emerging from such initiatives. Allowing people to discover local services and create micro market economies is something companies are increasingly exploring. We should see more of it emerging this year.
The unseasonal rain and changing weather pattern brought extensive flood damage to many cities. It brought to attention the way we build cities — for the here-and-now, with scant regard for geography or cross-sectoral interdependencies; encroaching upon lakes, building gated communities and creating sprawls.
The sprawl has also brought huge pressure on transport. Large gated townships are being given approvals with no involvement of public transport operators. This will worsen congestion and pollution in our cities that are already reeling from these problems. Creating regulatory authorities which can integrate land use and transport in large cities across many silos and implementing Transit-Oriented Development policies can fix this. This will also catalyse public transport adoption, ensuring no housing is approved without approved plan for public transport. We should peg our election choices to positive moves on such actions.
The urban poor are definitely a casualty of increasing housing costs. Mixed use development should be encouraged by trading rights for taller buildings in return for green public spaces and affordable housing for the people working in the neighbourhood. This will increase the economic vitality and create 15-minute neighbourhoods where most services are available within walking or cycling distance, and with access to public transport. Infrastructure coordination will need a strong regulator across cities.
The Clean Air Street on Church Street showed pedestrianisation of a street can benefit local economies. Many neighbourhoods across cities will begin to see such initiatives. This will be driven by transition to electric vehicles, especially by last-mile delivery and light cargo operators. This will create a strong baseline for clean growth. We will see consumer demand for more such clean technologies, especially in the two- and three-wheeler space this year.
Overall, there is strong momentum towards cleaning up our cities and habits. If we can pay attention to these outcomes in the information overload of the connected world, we will be able to complete the phrase with “many miles covered”.
Sathya Sankaran,
Urban Mobility Consultant & Bicycle Mayor, Bengaluru