Temkar Jagdish Vinay

4669-8

The Studio – Understanding the city, through various exercises throughout the semester, has helped students understand the city through different perspectives and how they shape our cities, and societies by studying a neighbourhood in Ahmedabad. A total of 156 numbers of unique locations in the city were identified, to be studied by the students, where each student was assigned a neighborhood with 1 sq. km. area. I was assigned the neighborhood in Shashtrinagar, which is located in the north-west part of the city, along the 132 ft wide ring road. It is predominantly a residential neighbourhood with cooperative housing societies, developed by the Gujarat housing board in the 1970s. It was earlier an agricultural environment, which gradually developed into a residential neighbourhood, and thus incorporated into the city. The study aims at understanding how various factors at the planning level affect livelihood and lifestyle of the people. To identify critical details in order to understand the implications of the policy decisions at a planning stage, that were taken during development of the neighbourhood, and to understand the effect of the growing city on it and vice versa. Shashtrinagar has been unchanged for decades since it was built, where closely packed apartments in low rise structures dominate the neighborhood. These structures have been standing for almost 40 years, and now many are in critical condition. In my perspective, ‘Dull’, ‘Serene’ and ‘Monotonous’ are the three words that represent the neighborhood. Though, this might change soon, as Shashtrinagar is on the verge of transformation (sans redevelopment). Shashtrinagar had a green belt earlier which was later reassigned for residential development. This empty, vacant belt of land has isolated the neighbourhood from the growing city for long. Looking at the map, one can observe that the neighborhood is fragmented, with green belt on one side and the ring road on the other side. It also has the Sola road on one side and railway line on the other far side which further separates the neighborhood from the city. I have tried to study the impact of the above conditions on the residents and their lifestyles.