PUBLIC TRANSPORT - Revisiting fundamentals

Please visit my web page "Urban Tenets" at https://urbantenets.nl/

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- There is no such thing as over creation of public transport infrastructure as where it is actually needed no amount of infrastructure is enough; still if you witness a ghost metro anywhere know that it's just bad planning.

- Know that not everyone rides a public transport out of choice or environmental awareness; for some there is no other choice

- Lack of last mile seamless, quality and safe connectivity to doorstep is single most deterrent towards use of public transport

-They might not disclose, but they should reach break-even much before projected time, and why not, as crowd keeps overwhelming the public transport system, pusing frequently the boundaries of design safety. Their perplexity, they can't show in their financial modeling sheet that design safety compromise of public transport system will be a frequent and regular phenomenon.

#publictransport #transportplanning #urbanplanning

CITY SOLID WASTE MANAGEMENT

 Please visit my web page "Urban Tenets" at https://urbantenets.nl/

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(Need for clear long-term Vision and policy restructuring)

-Those who are factory producing and mass packaging have no plan, linkage or obligation towards ultimate waste handling and minimization.

-Waste minimization and recycling linked Tax saving incentives at all levels from goods producer to consumer to waste generators can see radical reduction in ultimate waste

-In a Dystopian future scenario city gets consumed in its own waste

-In a Utopian future civilisation scenario, humans have to be out of waste handling, segregation, recycling and landfill process!

#wastemanagement #future #landfill #urbanplanning #waste #solidwaste #municipalsolidwaste #msw #commerce #industry

Architecture as it has been and as it is today, is only capable to offer geometric solution to your organic needs, with exceptions!

Please visit my web page "Urban Tenets" at https://urbantenets.nl/

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Case of Residential Architecture.

Theoretically "Form follows function" Makes sense, but in actuality "Building/ unit Form" first follows budget, building bylaws, construction practice, construction technology, modular product specifications being used in building and interior and real estate trend; dependency of form on "Function" comes last, rather it's a vague idea i.e., considering each individual or collectively as a household having a specific spatial bubble requirement based on their height, size, no. of family members, type of work, hobby, habit, health condition, cultural preferences etc. Still, irrespective of whatever form and anthropometric spatial dimensions that suits you and your family collectively, you will still have to settle for whatever real estate developer has to offer, unless you are filthy rich, uness you are getting your home designed at a remote location beyond municipal jurisdiction, and unless your architect is actually sensitive and considerate for your known and latent needs, and unless he or she knows how to beat the bylaws while staying within statutory confinements.

Idea of correct typology, dimensions and hierarchy of architectural spaces in your home, is not your own, it has been imposed on you for other's convenience. Three fold challenges are seens in architectural practice i. e. one, most of the input criteria of architectural design is already pre-defined leaving little room for creativity and accommodating client specific needs, secondly most clients themselves are not aware about their own needs and they stick to their superficial requirements as architectural brief, lastly most architects seldomly play a role of client's counselor to understand their needs more comprehensively and deeply.

Author: Anoop Jha

#architecture #urbanplanning #architect #buildingbylaws #bylaws #municipal #design #cityplanning #smartcity #interiordesign 

WATER SUPPLY - Revisiting demand estimation approach

Please visit my web page "Urban Tenets" at https://urbantenets.nl/

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Flat assumption of Litre Per Capita Per Day (LPCD) water requirement as basis for residential water demand is most likely to give wrong estimate, error compounded by a)Fixed average household size considered b) multiple available choices for base year population like census, property tax records, existing municipal billing records c) randomised selection of population growth rate formula d) no consideration of water saving fixtures and appliances in the equation, e) no consideration of regional lifestyle peculiarity f) no consideration of water demand fluctuation over seasonal weather change cycle g) no consideration for emerging lifestyle changes

You will see why they pay little attention to such fundamental assumptions with this example. Have they revised per capita water requirement after covid Pandemic, hence the revised water demand at city level? Answer is "No", while no one failed to recommend that keep washing your hands frequently for instance. Imagine millions and millions of people suddenly started washing hands several times a day as a newly adopted lifestyle changes, some taking shower everytime they returned home from outside, but no thought given to accommodate likely changes in per capita water consumption due to same.

Further, are they going to revise Litre Per Capita Per Day number based on new lifestyle changes post Covid19 as citizens are likely to continue practicing good hygiene in future, adding more pressure on water demand. Likely answer is "No", but correct answer is that "they must revisit" LPCD number, including all other missed criteria as mentioned above.

Multi-criteria demand assessment and Agility are key to stay relevant when it comes to urban infrastructure planning.

Author: Anoop Jha

#watersupply #waterinfrastructure #infrastructure #demand #supply #estimation #smartcity #urbanplanning #cityplanning #townplanning #savewater #waterresource #wtp #municipality #municipalcorporation #ulb 

CITY STORM WATER DRAINAGE SYSTEM -Revisiting fundamentals

Please visit my web page "Urban Tenets" at https://urbantenets.nl/

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SITUATION

No matter how well you plan Storm Water Drainage System, it often fails as it has so many missed variables, scores of design and operational dependencies, aging infrastructure and multitude of agencies to put blame on, later on.

TREND

Storm water and Urban Flood used to be two different things, but their boundaries have started to get blurred, as rainfall events are getting more unpredictable and severe due to climate change and as normal rainfall events have frequently started causing sticky urban floods that is not easily dissipated.

POSSIBLE MEANS TO DEAL WITH SITUATION

There are only couple of ways you can deal with storm water inundation and urban flood events, i.e. either move the city elsewhere OR tame the nature through uphill dams and artificial mega wetlands at outskirts OR brace the city with flood barriers OR capture and store part of runoff water allowing as much water to percolate if water table permits OR make way for water and allow storm water and floods to pass through city while assuring minimum impact and damage.

CHALLENGES

Temporal rainfall data of whatever time period used in modeling is primarily historic data, there is no consideration for future rainfall event modeling considering climate change, increasingly aggressive weather events being witnessed every passing year.

Historic Flood data doesn't consider cause and effect of flood due to slow or sometimes radical temporal change in built form and landscape of city.

Expanding cities, increasing paved areas, shrinking greens and disappearing urban waterbodies are changing the overall runoff coefficient of city converting normal rainfall event into disastrous situations and unmanaged events.

OPTIMAL SOLUTION

Instead or in addition to regular storm water network if you plan or redevelop your city as well as design buildings to allow periodic Inundation and water retention and absorption, that will be less destructive and less overwhelming then flash floods due to heavy downpour and in case of actual flood events.

It's important to keep reiterating that Multicriteria based assessment, design and scenario modeling is of utmost importance for planning any urban core infrastructure, be it SWD, SWM, Water Supply or Power Distribution.

#urbanplanning #smartcity #stormwatermanagement #sustainability #future #water #flood #swale #LID #zerowaste #urban #cityplanning #townplnaning #municipality #municipalcorporation

Possibly solution to city's space and resource scarcity is within city limits itself!

Please visit my web page "Urban Tenets" at https://urbantenets.nl/

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POPULATION AND DENSITY

How many people can peacefully and respectfully coexist within one Square Kilometer of a city without compromising on functionality and respectable individual social space. You have empirical examples and you can also make a simulation model of maximum density case scenario including residential, working and transitory population. Acknowledging that population density is never a correct indicator of quality of life. Acknowledging that 2 dimensional approach of population density should be revisited to include 3rd dimension as more and more people are being accommodated vertically, and as more and more utilities, mobility, asset, cargo can be accommodated underground in coming times.

CONSTRUCTION

How much Built Up Area (BUA) a City can technically hold within one Sqkm, given the limitation of existing construction technology, available sustainable material of choice and considering requirements of structural stability. You can build and test scenarios and models based on type of landuse including mixeduse case and you can also make digital twin/ BIM/vGIS model to check if model is workable as habitable. Acknowledging that Hong kong style housing was never an ideal architectural concept of creating more built-up area in a city and it was only a technological and financial constraint. Rather imagine constructing a Cubic Km of monolith Real Estate including private and public space like a perforated Swiss Cheese in form of space frame as a maximum BUA case scenarios.

BIODIVERSITY

How much Biotic Diversity in terms of native regional flora, fauna and wild meadows can be accommodated in a Cubic km of City along with humans without overwhelming, compromising or competing for space and other resources considering their growh rate. Acknowledging that way too much of biodiversity in a city was never a good idea, like some exotic species leading to biodiversity nuisance and like beehive on every corporate office and public buildings leading to severe pollination issues.

SUSTAINABILITY AND SELF-RELIANCE

How much self sustainability a Cubic km of city can achieve in terms of it's own

1) Food security,

2) Energy needs

3) Waste load management and

4) Water security, through range of means-

1.a) Urban agricultural, edible landscape, Food forest, community seed bank, school seed bank, vertical farm, rooftop greenhouse, bush food experience, kitchen garden, aquaponic, hydroponics, aeroponic, doomsday vault, extended shelf life solutions-

2.b) Energy education, energy aware lifestyle, energy conservation by design, interventions and appliances, energy load management, IoT and edge devices, building energy load management through solar passive architecture, building insulation/ ventilation, harvesting and storing energy from sun, wind, algae, river, stream, canal, organic waste; biofuels, heat recovery from process and thermal storage, Air Source Heat Pump/ ASHP, open window detection, micro turbine-

3.c) Waste reduction, circular waste economy, recycling, reuse, upcycle, repurpose, near zero construction waste,

4.d) Water conservation, treated sewage effluent, waste water treatment, IOT Sensors, water saving appliances, precision agriculture, mist irrigation, water from air condensation, extracting drinking water from air and others, flood water harvesting, storm water retention basin, cloud seeding,.

Author: Anoop Jha

#urbanplanning #cityplanning #townplanning #sustainability 

Burden and footprint of Packaging; a fair share of it can be avoided!

Please visit my web page "Urban Tenets" at https://urbantenets.nl/

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Ready to consume edible products packed and collected or delivered to doorstep (burger for instance) still leaving substantial and growing inorganic packaging residual for good, as more and more people placing order online.

Edible products with little shelf life (Juice for instance) consumed or expired soon leaving it's packaging footprint mostly local but forever or for too long. Consumers must be informed that such products don't suddenly gets expired one fine day, give them the range and chart stating how consistency and taste may get compromised over time still in consumable range, also tell them how to increase shelf life.

Non-edible products coming with shelf life and consumed in numbers ( Shampoo for instance), have regional, sometimes national packaging waste footprint. Mostly delivered across regions by e-commerce websites.

Non perishable products having only expiry date wrt trend (shoes for instance) and consumed in bulk witnesses global packaging waste footprint.

Then there are another kind of packaging waste burden i. e. where individual or collective packaging weight and/or volume is rather more or many fold of product/s inside, and having huge market. (Gift hampers, festive gifts etc. for instance). In this category higher you go up towards luxury segment more wastage is witnessed.

Bulk packaging is being excluded from the discussion as they have relatively organised supply-collection chain and higher recycling percentage.

Author:Anoop Jha

#waste #urbanplanning #packagingwaste #landfill #recycling #swm #municipal #msw