Eating is an agricultural act - Wendell Berry

Monday, March 16, 2009

dharavi slum?

no, say the residents and the airoots team over the slumdog/dharavi issue.
The Indian media widely reported popular outrage at the word ‘dog’. But what we heard from Manju Keny, a 19 year - old college student living in Dharavi - was something else. She was upset at the word ‘slum’.

We could not agree more.

it is a "user-generated" city
Dharavi is the ultimate user-generated city. Its urban and economic development relies on the intensive use of social networks and communities. Each of Dharavi’s 80 plus neighborhoods has been incrementally developed by generations of residents updating their shelters and businesses according to needs and means. This organizational logic is neither new nor unique to Dharavi, but we have never been in a better time to understand it. Just as the development of open source software requires guidelines and coordination; all Dharavi needs is some support from the government – mostly in the form of giving its functioning some legitimacy by providing the same services as in any other part of the city– and then trusting its inhabitants to continue from there.
the urban typhoon and dharavi.org are other fabulous places to be to learn more on dharavi.
the population density stats are just staggering
Dharavi is an extremely dense environment. A recent survey by the Kamla Raheja Vidyanidhi Institute of Architecture (KRVIA) established that a central area of Dharavi (Chamra Bazaar) contained densities of up to 336,643 people per square kilometer! Assuming a population of 700,000, the population density in Dharavi would be around 314,887/km². This is 11 times as dense as Mumbai as a whole (the most densely populated city in the world with 29,500 people/km²) and more than 6 times as dense as daytime Manhattan (about 50,000 people/km²).

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