Infrastructure has not kept pace with this development in the way we would want it. A two hour commute from Gurgaon to NOIDA or Goregaon to Churchgate are the classic examples. However there seems to be a sense of urgency that is now creeping up….maybe a decade too late, to get things in order. Case in point, the new airport terminals in Bangalore, Hyderabad and New Delhi all opening in the span of 12 months.

Gautam Bhatia, a very well know architect and writer talks about this event in his recent article in the Times of India and touches upon a very “touchy” topic. Why does India invite foreign architects, planners, and designers to conceptualize things for them. Where is the homegrown talent and the pride in the same.

His reasoning for the most part follows a very predictable arguement that has been tossed around for a few years. However from whatever I have gathered, there is a dearth of the technical expertise to somehow figure out the logistical and programming challenges that come with mega projects. And with the need to get them built as of yesterday; there is a very small margin of error for experimentation and a trial  error exercise.

It is only a matter of time, if not already in place; that Indian firms will have the expertise that they have picked up working side by side with these foreign firms to have the confidence to deal with megastructures and projects. Till then there is no shortcut out. Or at least one without risks.

Continue reading Gautam Bhatia’s article

Pride of India ?

By Gautam Bhatia / Times of India

When questioned about the cultural and technological stagnation that came with socialism, a bureaucrat in Nehru’s time once remarked that all the best work had already been done in the West, and we merely had to pick ideas for our own use. At a time when Indian inventiveness and productivity were state-controlled and highly suspect, borrowing made a lot of sense.

Sadly, even in today’s era of open economic borders, we still remain unconvinced that the Indian mind is capable of producing anything of real value. The new Terminal 3 at Delhi’s Indira Gandhi International airport is cited as the eighth-largest in the world, and comes loaded with other enthralling statistics: a floor area of over six million square feet, the equivalent of 20 malls, 92 automatic walkways, 78 aerobridges and 168 check-in counters. In every respect, the building showcases all the high-tech skills of construction and automation, and all the customer satisfying conveniences that say that the building belongs to the new century.

Certainly, the successful completion of a large and complex structure like an airport is to be commended. But is the satisfaction of statistical demands the only way to go?

What makes London’s Heathrow airport a traveller’s nightmare is the unfortunate mile after mile of mind-numbing anonymity that goes with the experience of moving 40 million people annually. Jakarta airport may not be in the same league, but its thoughtful, extremely Indonesian layout provides precisely the opposite experience. You move past courtyards of plantations that induce a quiet intimacy and a background of such calm that the trials of long distance travel are subdued and annulled.

But Jakarta and London are specific to the identities of the two very different places. Unfortunately the grand design of infrastructure in India is still based on the bureaucrat’s belief that the best work has already happened in the West. Terminal 3, though built in Delhi, was designed by American architects, and managed by MGF, a Dubai-based construction consortium. It uses tempered glass, a steel frame, and aluminum cladding all shipped from abroad. However, as a concession to India, Indian labour was employed in its erection. World class it is, because it’s conceived and built by the world.

The various venues for the upcoming Commonwealth Games reveal a similar story. Peddle Thorp, an Australian architecture firm, has designed the indoor stadium for badminton and squash; the new, aquatic centre is the brainchild of a foreign company that specialises in water sports facilities; the refurbishment of Jawaharlal Nehru stadium, which now looks like a space ship, was carried out by the German engineering firm of Schlaich Bergermann and Partners. The food concessions at the Games Village are being handled by another Australian company. In almost all facilities, the foreign hand can be felt from conception to realisation, catering to management. Enthralled by the scale of the endeavours, the shine and sparkle of steel and glass, as Indians we have stood by proudly to watch from the sidelines.

Foreign technology and inventiveness on Indian soil is certainly not new, especially in a country that has had a long history of direct imitation and mimicry. In the 1970s, it was a matter of Punjabi pride that the world’s most successful innovations could be copied in Ludhiana. Grimy workshops filled with labour were kept busy producing German machine parts, American denim, and other sundry items picked up in European markets. Indian businessmen travelled abroad to European industrial fairs and American specialty stores merely to buy items that could be duplicated in India at a fifth of the cost. Today, things remain much the same, only the scale of the borrowing has changed; as an open society we need no longer secretly copy and produce, but invite the original inventors to participate in a global bid.

By comparison, the 1982 Asian Games were a wholly indigenous effort. Local architects and construction firms built modestly, with brick and plaster, whitewashing the buildings before the foreigners arrived. The athletes were garlanded at an airport where the fused tube lights were quickly changed and the staff instructed to smile and take fewer tea breaks. Everyone stayed at a games village constructed by the PWD and travelled around in a bus service quite similar to the ordinary commuter’s. By all counts, the city and its services put up an entirely Indian and reasonably successful show.

While many of the new projects for the Commonwealth Games airports, stadiums and metro stations provide sparkle to the ramshackle grime of the Indian city, they remain foreign implants, silent spaceships sent by self-absorbed cultures. Faced with situations and conditions that are uniquely Indian, none among the new buildings seek Indian resolutions. Designed neither for the unforgiving landscape nor the general misuse of public facilities expected in India, their long-term usefulness is suspect.

Hard-pressed though we are to find symbols of the new India, the new terminal, with its import of foreign designs, foreign materials and construction technology, does little to promote India and Indian ideas. If the prime minister is proud of the airport as the gateway to a new global India, as he said at its inauguration, he is only crediting the many international companies now working in the country, thanking them for making India appear more efficient, more competent, more capable…more, well, like everyone else.

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Since the 90’s we have had proclamations from politicians wanting to make Mumbai the next  Shanghai, Singapore or Dubai; depending on the flavor of the month.

What most people dont realize is that Nariman Point is over 40 years old in the present form. And its buildings are crumbling or in poor shape. And the rents are double that of Midtown Manhattan.

Infrastructure wise, its not as bad as other parts of Mumbai. However it would serve some owners well to demolish and build more efficient buildings, in terms of space, design and sustainability. Then the sky-high rents are justified.

Inevitably it may happen. As more and more businesses move away, owners might do just that. I’d rather they be proctive about it, than doing it as a reaction to market forces alone.

UBS, JP Morgan lead Nariman Point exodus

By Pooja Thakur, for Bloomberg

MUMBAI: UBS AG and JPMorgan Chase & Co. are leading an exodus of finance companies from Mumbai’s Nariman Point financial district as they balk at paying double midtown-Manhattan rents for crumbling four-decade-old buildings.

UBS, Switzerland’s biggest bank, moved to a new complex on the site of a drive-in cinema about nine miles north. JPMorgan, the second-biggest US lender, shifted to an adjacent suburb, while private-equity firm KKR & Co. went about three miles north of Nariman Point. Axis Bank and broker Motilal Oswal Financial Services are moving in the next year.

They are departing a district reclaimed from the Arabian Sea in 1940 that is marred by traffic jams and poor sanitation, and constrained by a 46 year old law that limits building height. The city’s shortcomings and fragmentation may hinder Mumbai, with the fourth-most expensive office space in the world, from establishing a financial center to rival Shanghai and Dubai.

"Transforming Mumbai into a world class financial center is very distant," said Sunil Saberwal, chief executive officer of Bombay First, an organization modeled on London First to work towards the regeneration of Mumbai. "We are at least 15 to 20 years away from something like that. Even then, Mumbai will not be as beautiful as Dubai, but it will be functional."

If Mumbai doesn’t get its act together by 2030 by improving transportation, housing and water systems, and reducing costs, the city may lose out to places such as Dubai as Western companies seek a base in the time zone, Saberwal said.

Continue reading at BloombergUTV

India’s urban awakening: Building inclusive cities, sustaining economic growth

India has a young and rapidly growing population—a potential demographic dividend. But India needs thriving cities if that dividend is to pay out. New MGI research estimates that cities could generate 70 percent of net new jobs created to 2030, produce around 70 percent of Indian GDP, and drive a near fourfold increase in per capita incomes across the nation.

Handled well, India can reap significant benefits from urbanization. MGI offers a range of recommendations, the vast majority of which India could implement within five to ten years. If India were to follow the recommendations, it could add 1 to 1.5 percent to annual GDP growth, bringing the economy near to the double-digit growth to which the government aspires.

Surging growth and employment in cities will be a powerful magnet. MGI projections show India’s urban population soaring from 340 million in 2008 to 590 million in 2030. And this urban expansion will happen at a speed quite unlike anything India has seen before. It took India nearly 40 years (between 1971 and 2008) for the urban population to rise by nearly 230 million. It will take only half the time to add the next 250 million.

India has the potential to unlock many new growth markets in its cities, many of them not traditionally associated with India including infrastructure, transportation, health care, education, and recreation. MGI projects that, to meet urban demand, the economy will have to build between 700 million and 900 million square meters of residential and commercial space a year. In transportation, India needs to build 350 to 400 kilometers of metros and subways every year, more than 20 times the capacity building of this type that India has achieved in the past decade. In addition, between 19,000 and 25,000 kilometers of road lanes would need to be built every year (including lanes for bus-based rapid transit systems), nearly equal to the road lanes constructed over the past decade.

Cities can also deliver a higher quality of life. Urban scale benefits means the cost of delivering basic services is 30 to 40 percent cheaper in concentrated population centers than in sparsely populated areas. But to reap such benefits, India needs to meet an unprecedented policy challenge. If it fails to do so, this could seriously jeopardize its growth and risk high unemployment.

Although urban India has attracted investment on the back of strong growth, its cities are still failing to deliver even a basic standard of living for their residents after years of chronic underinvestment. Unless it steps up investment in its cities, India could well lose the productivity dividend of urban living. Today, in per capita terms, India’s annual capital spending of $17 is only 14 percent of China’s $116 and less than 6 percent of New York’s $292.

MGI estimates that India needs to invest $1.2 trillion just in capital expenditure in its cities over the next 20 years, equivalent to $134 per capita per year, almost eight times the level of spending today. If India taps into five sources of funding used in cities around the world—monetized land assets, higher property taxes, user charges that reflect costs, debt and public-private partnerships, and formula-based government funding—its largest cities could generate as much as 80 percent of the funding they require from internal sources.

I wonder what the fascination is with foreign architects. Anyways, Michael Hopkins claim to fame is the design of the new facilities at Lords, the mecca of cricket.

Here is a blurb from Hopkins website

The sloping site enjoys superb panoramic views. Rebalancing levels results in a bowl of terraced seating for spectators centred on the Match Ground, creating a "place" around which development can grow. Four stands sit over this terrace accessed via a wide pedestrian concourse, the gaps between not only providing views to the horizon but airflow and daylight. Upper levels include further seating for spectators, a Members’ Pavilion, hospitality boxes, and facilities for broadcasting and press. Parking is provided on surrounding land.

With cricket played November-May, the sun is often low. Membrane roofs provide shade and, together with the elegantly braced structure of the steel and concrete stands in this seismic zone, create a memorable form for the Stadium.

This stadium bears importance to the IPL with the recent announcement that Pune is one of the new IPL franchises for 2011.

Lords architect has designs on IPLstadium for city

By: Chandran Iyer / Mid-Day

What is the common thread linking the new stadium to come up near the city for IPL matches with the Lords stadium of London and? The answer is an architect called Michael Hopkins.

The UK-based architect has designed the Lords and will now be responsible for the design of the stadium coming up in Gahunje along the Pune-Mumbai Expressway.

"Designed by one of the world’s leading architects, the MCA (Maharashtra Cricket Association) stadium will be one of the most modern and cricket-friendly venues in the world. The main work of designing the stadium  has been done by the firm Michael Hopkin Architects and Hopkin’s  assistant Ernest Phasania is likely to arrive in the city soon to oversee the project," said MCA president Ajay Shirke.

Shirke added, "We are developing a concept we call lounge cricket. Each lounge will have a private viewing gallery, two meeting rooms and a pantry."

Safety norms

An important aspect of the stadium will be its design keeping in mind fire safety and evacuation norms.

"The problem with stadiums in India is they don’t have proper entry space for fire engines. In case of a fire the response of the people is to rush on to the ground. But in most stadiums there is hardly any entry space for fire engines. This stadium is going to be different. It is designed for fire safety and evacuation norms based on the world standard Green Guide, with proper fire tending access and emergency escape routes," said Shirke.

Former chairman of selection committed and veteran cricketer Chandu Borde, commenting on the upcoming stadium, said "I think it will be the best stadium in the cricketing world. It will be equipped with all modern facilities and it will be the best option for IPL matches."

By Preeti Parashar / Indian Express

As the world’s tallest building, the 828-metreBurj Khalifa, alters the skyline of Dubai, other nations look on to join the race of tallest skyscrapers! Countries across the globe have been modifying their policies for developers and engineers to innovate and explore new designs. Where does India stand in this race? Do we have policies or guidelines that can make these skyscrapers a reality in India in the next ten years? The answers are still uncertain.

Given India’s low floor space index (FSI) policy—government regulations that allow specific number of building floors based on the land area, thus determining heights. India doesn’t have many skyscrapers (defined as buildings of over 24 m in height). As of now, except a 300-metre-high TV tower at Worli, Mumbai, India cannot boast of many tall buildings. Shreepati Arcade, constructed in 2002 is another tall building in the city with 45 floors and a height of 153 metres. Soon two residential towers in Mumbai—Imperial Towers (149 m) and India Tower (a hotel, 301 m)—will be completed.

Of the newer constructions, the APIIC Tower (Andhra Pradesh Industrial Infrastructure Corporation Tower) being built at Hyderabad is expected to be a 100-storey building with a height of 450 metres. Lanco Hills at Hyderabad, which is a 100-acre township project, is likely to house a signature tower with over 90 storeys. The Noida Tower, conceptualised by architect Hafeez Contractor, can bring India on the world map with a height of 710 metres, but the project is on hold. Bengaluru Turf Tower (660 m) and the Maharishi Vedic Vishwa Prashasan building (678 m) proposed near Jabalpur are other contenders for the tallest building spaces in India.

A majority of real estate developers and market analysts feel that it’s imperative for the FSI norms to be relaxed for India to grow the vertical way. It will facilitate effective use of land. Many agree that in order to compete globally, Indian FSI standards should be increased from 1-3 to at least 10-25. Sachin Sandhir, MD and country head, Royal Institution of Chartered Surveyors India, feels that FSI is considered to be an important determinant in development. “In India the FSI is exceptionally low, even when compared to Asian cities such as Singapore, Bangkok, Malaysia, etc, where it is benchmarked between 5 and 50. In order for the Indian real estate market to compete on a global platform, an upward revision needs to be considered. However, increasing the FSR puts additional load on existing infrastructure, “ he says.

Recently, in a national conference organised by the Confederation of Real Estate Developers’ Associations of India, delegates requested the government to increase the FSI across the country.

Reiterating the point, Manoj Goyal, VP, Raheja Developers, says, “Stringent norms to get height clearance act as a major impediment in the way of building tall structures. Almost all metro towns (where skyscrapers can be built) are in areas controlled by the Airport Authority. Presently, FSI allowed is 1.50-2.75 in all metros and ground coverage is 30-40%. It is insufficient to build skyscrapers here.” He adds, “The maximum height that can be built (based on per acres calculation) is approximately nine floors (about 30 m). To make a 800-metre-high tower in India, developers need a minimum of 150 acres (as per FSI and ground coverage allowed), impossible in metros.”

Another factor where India is lagging behind in constructing skyscrapers seems to be lack of technical knowhow. Samir Chopra, Director, RE/MAX India, elaborates, “In India, there is low awareness about the benefits of tall buildings. There are inherent fears that exist, again due to lack of knowledge. Also, there is not much availability of technical knowhow. The expertise required is still limited to a few companies and, therefore, costs more and is time consuming. We in India still haven’t reached the level of development where construction takes place at a very fast pace and a piece of land can start generating revenue in a very short span of time. And our planning is not so synchronised with long-term goals.”

Sunil Jindal, CEO, SVP Builders India, agrees. “Developers restrain from entering the tall building segment due to lack of technology and the price factor. Where average construction cost of a conventional building comes to around Rs 1,500-2,000 per sq ft, a tall building will cost around Rs 4,000-5,000 per sq ft or more.”

Tall buildings are also seen as a solution to the space problem that urban India is facing. Since there is a near saturation of the land available within the city boundaries for any use, be it residential or commercial, the solution would be to conduct a land audit and construct viable tall structures, which will generate greater availability of space per square feet of ground area used. Building tall is not an option anymore, it is almost inevitable. “Basically, high-rise buildings provide developers with a means of saving on land costs. They open up wider arenas to operate on. This means projects will be cheaper on a unit-to-unit basis and also more plentiful in profitable areas, which is good news for investors and the buyers. However, allowing high-rises indiscriminately in certain city areas is definitely asking for trouble, and will result in an infrastructure deadlock and eventual fall in prices,” says Gagan Singh, CEO, project development services, Jones Lang LaSalle Meghraj.

Goyal from Raheja Developers disagrees, “In my opinion, tall buildings will not solve the space crunch in urban India. Based on present FAR affordable housing in metros is not possible.”

However Manish Periwal, CMD, Pioneer Urban Land and Infrastructure, believes that tall buildings help in proper allocation of resources and utilisation of space. “Verticality leads to compact development and better accessibility. It also brings down the costs of water and waste management. Distinguished technological expertise and more cooperation from the government can help redefine urban India,” he says.

“Hyderabad swelled from 174 sq km to 625 sq km, putting a lot of pressure on its infrastructure. The hi-tech city has fibre optic lines but no sewer lines! Huge investments are needed to provide roads, drainage, water pipelines, sewerage system, mass transport etc. Sensible tall buildings to some extent may ease this pain,” says Karuna Gopal, President, Foundation for Futuristic Cities.

A few like Rohit Raj Modi, spokesperson, Raj Nagar extension developers’ association, feel skyscrapers are not symbolic of a nation’s economic development. “If there exist good infrastructure facilities such as sanitation, water, roads, connectivity, etc, that itself speaks volumes about the economic development of a country,” he says. Seconding his view, Chopra from RE/MAX adds, “What we need today is integrated development. This is possible only through adequate planning. This will help plan an area, which will be self-sufficient, energy efficient and therefore environment-friendly. ”

“There is a need for more service providers of eco-friendly construction materials to reduce costs,” says Periwal.

However Sandhir thinks of high-rises as financially viable, especially in cities where there is no alternative to vertical expansion. He says, “From the environmental perspective, too, these buildings could be considered viable as densely populated spaces are less carbon intensive and usually better served by existing public transport and other infrastructure amenities.” But few developers caution that as skyscrapers consume more energy and contribute a lot in warming of surroundings it leads to more climate changes.

The future of green skyscrapers seems bright in India and they hold great potential. Chopra says, “To match India’s increasing demand for housing for its ever-rising population, it certainly sounds like the most viable solution.” Singh from JLLM feels, “Realistically, we are a long way off from seeing sustainable skyscrapers as a norm rather than exceptions to the rule in India. Cost will continue to dictate most construction in this country and the fact remains that such buildings are extremely costly to develop.”

The government is moving in the right direction. Delhi’s proposed Master Plan 2021 envisages planned development on 27,000 hectares. It has also approved of private participation in mega construction projects and hi-rise building activity. The higher FAR permitted by the Plan will allow most houses to go up to four floors. The buildings can be taller—going up to 14 to 16 floors if builders and developers are able to amalgamate an area of at least 4,000 sq m. This is if they take care of three things—set up an effluent treatment plant so as to not choke up the sewerage system, put up solar panels to generate some power and build underground parking.

Efforts are being made to grow vertically but India still has a long way to go.

With inputs from Kiran Yadav

Winston Churchill said, “We make our buildings and afterwards they make us.” A tall building reaching for the sky is the most potent and visible symbol of success and technological savoir faire. Tall buildings in urban setting can be efficient use of land if build properly—they pack more people on less land and preserve open spaces and farms that supply local food. However, tall buildings can also perpetuate social segregation and isolation, much like a vertical gated community. A common damaging aspect of the tall building is how it meets the streets—lank walls and security gates destroy the street life. Streets are universally the most public spaces in a city. “Streets matter more than buildings,” notes Paul Goldberger, architecture critic for the New Yorker.

Just as well-designed tall buildings can be stand alone landmarks, badly designed tall buildings will not blend in easily and harm the image of the city. A total lack of public design review and decent development codes put the citizens at greater risk of getting architectural kitsch. Tall buildings that fail to incorporate energy-efficient solutions for lighting, ventilation and cooling also damage the environment.

Hesitant to go taller

Indian cities are amongst the most populated cities in the world and this density has largely been accommodated in low to mid-rise buildings. This is because Indian cities have the lowest floor space index (FSI), in the world. Government regulations that allow specific number of building floors based on the land area, thus determining heights, is called the floor space index. A larger FSI allows a taller building.The principle reason for controlling floor space index is to limit density to what the infrastructure can support. However, “controlling FSI does not reduce density, it just reduces floor consumption by making it more expensive,” explains Alain Bertaud, a World Bank consultant. More people occupy smaller units, resulting in unhealthy overcrowding. FSI slows down economic growth and takes away the revenue source to pay for infrastructure improvements and maintenance. Ill-conceived FSI are a major hindrance to tall buildings. Indian cities have over 50% of its population living in substandard or illegal housing. Indian cities are projected to add several million people. Taller buildings are going to be necessary. Where and how we grow are important considerations.

Planning starts at the regional level with a well thought out response based on transportation network, geographic limitation, environmental sensitivity, context and infrastructure—all of these factors help determine how this new density gets spread out throughout the region. At multi-modal transit hubs the FSI can be as high as 15-20, while in other sensitive areas the increase may be a modest 1 to 2.5 FSI. The FSI should be a range, not an absolute number. To access the higher FSI range, developers must mitigate the impacts and provide needed amenities.

Factors to consider

An analysis of the character of the city, in terms of physical attributes, together with the existing conditions or its potential for change, will determine areas in which intensification would be most appropriate. Tall buildings are appropriate in urban areas where land is limited and the area is served by public transit. Tall buildings typically become exclusive private spaces for the rich. Public access and well-designed public open spaces at the street level and public infrastructure improvements will allow tall towers to make a positive contribution to city life. Tall buildings should also provide housing for a diverse income range.

Tall towers should be designed for the Indian context. They should take advantage of the local climate—rainfall, light, ventilation, solar orientation without sacrificing the street-level orientation of buildings; history; local building materials and construction and individual choices and sensibilities of the cities. The city’s skyline should be viewed as its topography. Should tall buildings stand as monumental objects or form a deliberate skyline composition? “While a single tall building has high image value and is easier to insert at various locations in the city, the intensification from a single tall building is relatively low,” says Lora Nicolaou, Head of Res- earch, Urban Renaissance Institute. “Clusters of tall buildings achieve more intensification but may be appropriate only in few areas.” Each city needs a unique tall building strategy based on urban design, street level uses, infrastructure and local context.

The public sector should eliminate regulatory barriers. Form-based codes (FBC) produce predictable built results and a superior public realm by using physical form as the organising principle. FBCs are graphic-based codes that allow the public to visualise in advance the form and location of the streets, buildings, and open spaces leading to a higher comfort level with taller buildings.

Tall buildings should be self-sustaining and not depend on taxpayer funds to provide affordable housing, infrastructure improvements, network of mobility options, public amenities and maintenance. The public sector has to determine needs for each area and set up a developer impact fee system to fund onsite improvements. Tax Increment Financing (TIF) can fund off-site improvements. In TIF, the developer up-fronts the cost of infrastructure and gets refunded from the increment in taxes generated from new development. Maintenance can be funded by the creation of public-private partnerships.

Tall buildings consume a third more material and energy and require more service area and offer less usable floor space than a low or mid-rise building. “There’s no need to build tall just for the sake of it,” says Lora Nicolaou. Tall needs to be a planned strategy that delivers more efficiency in land use and innovative contextual design. Tall buildings need to enhance the neighbourhood by focusing on enhanced public realm, be sustainable and provide for abroad segment of the population.

The writer is Principal, Rangwala Associates

However, the exact opposite happens with physical infrastructure, especially intra city transportation. Traffic in most cities is nightmarish and it has only gotten worse every year. Every once in a while, a grandiose foolish scheme like the Bandra Worli Sea Link come to fruition but its more to inflate the politicians ego than to solve the problem for the long term.

Sarah Lacy in an article on TechCrunch.com makes a compelling case for the entrepreneurial spirit in the mobile sector, with Bangalore as a case-study. 

I completely agree with her reading of the lack of physical infrastructure having something to do with the fact that the government is in charge.

Entrepreneurs: Start. This. Company. Now.

By Sarah Lacy / Washington Post / TechCrunch.com

Thursday, November 19, 2009 1:29 AM

BANGALORE, INDIA ¿ It?s almost as if Russian cell phone carrier MTS has bought the naming rights to Bangalore. I half expected my immigration stamp to read ?BANGALORE! ? BROUGHT TO YOU BY MTS.? The carrier recently launched service in the uber-competitive Indian telecom market and has erected billboards every twenty feet or so. I have never seen so much advertising by one company in one space. They all sport an agro looking dude with his face twisted in some rebel-yell while he does inscrutable things with robots and mechanical arms holding different tech gadgets.

Why have these ads made such an impression on me? Because I?ve spent a week sitting in stopped Bangalore traffic looking at them. Ironically one keeps boasting: CONGESTION-FREE MOBILE NETWORK. Sitting still and listening to the honking of cars, mopeds, bikes and rickshaws all around me, it?s an easy guess that, if true, MTS could be the only thing congestion-free in India.

I used to think I knew bad traffic. After all, I moved to Silicon Valley during the famed Internet bubble when Highway 101 slowed to a crawl during peak commute hours. And I?ve spent time in legendarily congested US cities like Los Angeles and New York.

Now that India has one of the world?s best mobile infrastructures, it needs a decent road infrastructure. And a smart entrepreneur needs to come up with a modern fix. But before we talk solutions, let?s dwell more on the problem.

Simply put: All of you Americans?or Londoners for that matter?who Tweet about sitting in traffic have nothing to complain about compared to the emerging world. And in my experience, so far, India?s traffic is the absolute worst. A drive between cities that should take an hour takes four. A commute across a city can routinely take two hours-plus. We?re not talking about rush hour. I?ve quickly learned to allot at least three hours for each meeting?one hour for the meeting and one each for getting there and back.

Even so, despite my best efforts, I?ve been late for nearly every meeting. In Mumbai one meeting scheduled for late morning took six hours out of my day. (Fortunately, the meeting was well worth it.) And in Bangalore my cab driver tried to take a back-alley short cut, when suddenly, our path was blocked by a cow just munching on some roadside grass. He honked and honked and she just looked up and batted her pretty brown eyes at me as if to say, ?Oh, you?re not making that meeting on time, hon.?

Indians complain about the poor foresight and urban planning of their government, but it?s not all the government’s fault. The Chinese government is the master of over-building capacity to anticipate growth, and city traffic in China is becoming unbearable as well. It?ll only get worse as an anticipated 30% more cars per year come on the road.

The problem is the hyper-charged urbanization these countries have experienced. In the West cities grew over centuries allowing city planners to adjust and modernize as industrialization drove higher occupancy. And in the past few decades there?s been a flight out of downtowns to suburbs. Of course that presents its own growing pains?especially in US cities that have experienced massive suburban sprawl like Phoenix and Atlanta. But in the grand scheme of things, the moves have been predictable and manageable, whether individual cities have handled it well or not.

Not so with the rapid urbanization of cities like Beijing, Shanghai, Shenzhen, Delhi, Bangalore and Mumbai. The step up in pay from hundreds to thousands of US dollars a year has been swift and far reaching. In China, agricultural classes have moved en masse to staff huge several-thousand-person factories, and for the Olympics, they moved en masse into hospitality jobs in Beijing?s raft of new hotels, malls and restaurants. This is to say nothing of the increase in government jobs and startups. There is simply no way to make remotely the same wage or have the same access to infrastructure and services outside a city. In some parts of India it?s been more pronounced as hundreds of thousands of sophisticated R&D jobs typically pay more than China?s factory jobs.

Here?s my point: All the existing Western solutions, endless government funds, underground subways and top urban planners will not solve this problem. Because simply put: The world has never seen urbanization so extreme by millions?maybe even billions? of people seeking a better life. We need some innovation here. And I know at least one guy who is thinking about it.

At a conference earlier this year, Elon Musk ? the guy who co-founded PayPal, Tesla, SpaceX and laughs like a James Bond villain ? talked about two new businesses he was mulling. One was electric, supersonic planes, which I?ve salivated over since. The other was pre-fabricated freeway overpasses to alleviate traffic by making it go vertical without the costly billion-dollar customized expansion fees.

I have to admit, at the time, I was more excited about the planes. But his freeway idea may be a better business. It would dramatically affect the lives of billions (literally) and create at least millions of revenues in the developing world where quick, cheap options are needed and there is hot-and-heavy government money to pay for it.

Now, clearly Mr. Musk is busy with existing ventures Tesla and SpaceX. So now?s your chance to steal the market out from under him! India and China are waiting.

© 2009 TechCrunch

THE world has become so accustomed to labelling India as one of the world’s great engines of growth — alongside China — that it comes as a bit of a shock to discover that the reality is a little less dazzling.

Concrete and chaos are the best words to describe India today, as I discovered from a visit earlier this month. The concrete is the building activity you see everywhere, the chaos is the sense you quickly get that things are barely under control.

A typical Indian scene is a large construction site, cement mixers grinding and cranes toiling, while sacred cows munch the grass alongside and a torrent of battered cars, rickshaws and filthy trucks crashes by on the pitted roads. The air is full of noise and grit, but out of it will rise the gleaming headquarters of some new Indian corporate giant.

India’s economic progress is far from smooth, and its future is not assured. The country has suffered from the global crisis: growth is down from 8% to 6%, and its banks are bracing themselves for a wave of bad debts as the downturn takes its toll on high levels of personal and business borrowing. The government hopes to get growth back up to 7% by the end of the year, but the pessimists see more shrinkage ahead. Any major slowdown would be a disaster for a country so hooked on growth, and for its world image as a model emerging economy.

But it is not just the near-term business outlook that clouds India’s future. Structural problems have to be sorted out before the country could be said to be on a sustainable economic path.

The boom India has enjoyed so far has come from its decision in 1991 to “deregulate” its stagnant economy and make a dash for growth. The architect of the deregulation was Manmohan Singh, then India’s finance minister and now its prime minister, which is why he has a reputation as a “reformist”.

But after the initial boost, there has been little further reform. The Indian economy remains far from open: there are tight caps on foreign investment which protect inefficient — often monopolistic — domestic industries, and discourage the inflow of capital and technology. Large parts of the economy — notably the banking system — remain under state control. And the whole country labours under the dead weight of a large bureaucracy.

At the same time, the disparity between the economic winners and the millions of losers scratching a living in the slums and on the land, continues to grow. Only last week, the charity Save the Children reported that India had the worst child mortality rate in the world. This in a country that sends rockets into space and builds nuclear submarines.

Why is Singh not pressing ahead with his reforms? Opinions differ. Some argue that he is, though in a low-key way designed to minimise disruption, and win support within India’s federalised political system. Others think he has yielded to his conservative instincts: his policies strongly favour rural communities at the expense of the towns, which holds back change. A huge problem is farmers’ refusal to sell land for industrial development. AcelorMittal, the world’s largest steel company, has just joined the lengthening list of companies that are threatening to move elsewhere because it cannot build a 20bn plant.

This rural resistance must be symptomatic of a country that is growing too fast, where social change has to catch up with economic progress.

Of course, if India only manages 6% a year for a couple of years instead of 8%, that will still put it at the top of the world growth leagues, and with 1,2-billion people that counts for a lot. But the big difference between India and China is that the Chinese leadership is bent on development and can deliver, while the Indians seems more hesitant, and less able to bring the country along with it.

That may explain why, from a position 20 years ago where they were about equal, China’s gross domestic product per capita is now twice that of India’s and its economic clout very much greater. When people talk about India as a global economic power, that prospect is still some way off.

Lascelles is senior fellow of the Centre for the Study of Financial Innovation in London, and a former banking editor of the Financial Times.

The Maharashtra government is marking 50 years of the state by planning 50 ambitious projects, including Asia’s tallest building in the city.

“We have proposed the building as an iconic tower, which would be Asia’s tallest and have invited design and construction bids for it,” a senior official from the urban development department said.

The 531-metre high tower will be built at Wadala in Central Mumbai over 14 hectares of land, the official said, adding that the proposal has been submitted to the government. The tower will have commercial, recreational, academic and entertainment facilities, he said, adding, “the place has been chosen in such a way that it would be a conversion point for the proposed Monorail and Metro rail.”

To mark the Golden Jubilee celebrations of the coastal state, formed in 1960, the Congress-NCP Government is planning several projects. Chief Secretary Johny Joseph has convened a meeting of all departments tomorrow in this regard, the official said.

Original article here.

In China’s Southwest Sichuan province, the road to enlightenment is a superhighway.

In about 90 minutes, the highway zips travelers 180 kilometers from the provincial capital of Chengdu to the former farming hamlet of Leshan, home to a sitting Buddha that is more than 230-feet tall and 1,200 years old. Luxury busses, new model Buicks and Toyota sedans disgorge Chinese and foreign tourists into a city that has popped up in a matter of years, thanks largely to a road system that links Leshan to refurbished rail stations and international airports now just hours away.

Two decades ago, on my first visit to Leshan, the Big Buddha looked out across a river to rice paddies. The same view today is glass, steel and concrete of high rise buildings. Leshan’s economy is now both light and heavy industry, in addition to tourism.Not as idyllic as it once was, to be sure. But Leshan represents a small part of what has been Chinese government’s ambitious road build-out, a bet that massive state spending will yield greater returns in private investment, new jobs and stronger consumer demand. The bet has paid off so far.

Goldman Sachs predicts that, by 2041, China’s economy will be the largest in the world, out-sizing even the U.S. Similarly, Goldman forecasts India’s economy to surpass Japan by 2032.

But there’s a crucial difference that’s surfaced between the two imminent economic superpowers, China and India. China has shown that its central and local governments are capable of building road infrastructure to deliver current and future economic growth. India’s drive to do the same has sputtered, and the consequences of this torpid pace are clear for those who have recently spent time outside the big cities of both countries.

“Some new highways aren’t on the latest Chinese maps or GPS-aided Google maps.”

Although India’s rural areas have been resilient during the global economic crisis, the relatively fast growth has come mainly from a very low base – by virtue of being poor for so long. Shoddy infrastructure has sealed India’s rural communities and constrained investment and consumer demand. Even with the nascent development taking place now, swaths of India remain beholden to benign weather and welfare handouts, such as the National Rural Employment Guarantee Scheme, which offers 100 days of paid work to supplement farm incomes.

India’s total investment in infrastructure in 2006-2007 was estimated to be around 5% of gross domestic product, according to the latest figures from the Planning Commission.

By comparison, China’s infrastructure spending has been about 12-13% of GDP in the last few years.

If it’s to develop the same strong economic arteries, India must close this gap quickly. The Indian government appears to realize this, and on Monday, announced that its budget contained a 23% increase for highway construction. Foreign investors have been cautious about entering India’s infrastructure sector, so a previously announced $500 billion road revamp has been slow to materialize.

It’s sorely needed, as veterans of Indian road travel can attest.

A recent 300-kilometer trip from Delhi to the lakeside tourist town of Nainital in Uttarakhand was a full-day affair. We dodged large craters in the road and rattled over smaller holes; We swerved around cars going the wrong way and meandered by squatter villages built around half-constructed flyovers; We braked to avoid cows, goats, limping dogs, and one large, dead pig.

In China, road travel presents a different set of challenges. Superhighways spin out from the main cities, delivering one into a bewildering web of freshly-constructed roads crisscrossing the country. Some new highways aren’t on the latest Chinese maps or GPS-aided Google maps. The best navigational advice frequently comes from the tollbooth operator.

China’s road building has even outpaced the service infrastructure. On the newest highways, rest-stops advertised on billboards often weren’t there yet; many exits are sealed from unfinished off-ramps; petrol pumps are few and far between. On one pristine stretch of asphalt running beside acres of corn, five hours from Beijing, we ran out of gas. A police jeep buzzed past our pleading waves. My brother scooted down the flyover and hitched a short ride to a gas station and returned with enough fuel to get us to the next city.

One hundred kilometers and an hour later, the port city of Qingdao came into view. The four-lane highway delivered us to the heart of city, a former down-at-the-heels German colony transformed from my last visit a decade ago.

—Peter Wonacott is a WSJ reporter based in New Delhi

tallest structure with a built-up area of 60,000 lakh sq ft, the largest among such buildings in the world.

The Mumbai Metropolitan Region Development Authority (MMRDA) commissioner, Ratnakar Gaikwad, said permissions should be ready shortly for the project. "The building will generate Rs 2,000 crore in revenue through rent, which will go towards other development projects in the region,” said Gaikwad.

Speaking soon after a pre-bid meeting with companies interested in developing the project, Gaikwad said they had extended the last date for submissions for the pre-qualification bids to July 31.

The companies which attended the pre-qualification bid meeting were Reliance Infrastructure, India Bulls, Tata Realty and Infrastructure along with Scomi, Shapurji Pallonji, IL&FS Infrastructure, Pratibha Industries, Skylark Build, and Som Enterprises.
"The pre-qualification bids will be followed by technical and financial bids. We should be able to begin work on the project in October and it will take four to five years to be completed on a Design, Build, Own, Operate and Transfer basis,” he said.

Regarding the height of the building being a cause for concern for aviation safety, Gaikwad said experts have assured them that it would not be a problem. "We will put up the case before the Central minister for civil aviation, Praful Patel. Chief minister Ashok Chavan will also write a request for the project’s clearance,” he said.

The MMRDA joint commissioner, Ashwini Bhide, said Wadala would become a well-connected point with the new tower and infrastructure. The area would be connected to other parts of the city by the monorail and Metro rail lines; the trans-harbour project would link Wadala with Navi Mumbai. Bhide added that the Eastern Expressway would also be in close proximity.

Bhide said that Rs 40 crore has been allotted for paving roads around the project site.
"The shape of the building will depend on the developer’s design,” said Bhide, adding that the final design might have two towers instead of one.

"The building will have several hotels in it,” said deputy chief of transport planning, R Ramanna. "About 30 floors of the building will have seven-star hotels and luxury apartments. For the first 60 floors, there will be high-speed elevators while the rest of the building will have normal elevators.”

Ramanna said the building would be centrally air-conditioned, have electronic circuits, elevated transport and security, and the tenants would be allowed to change the decoration according their needs.

Original article here.