ISBN: 9789381576335    Publisher: Leadstart Publishing Year of publishing: 2013     Format:  Hardcover No of Pages: 234        Language: English

What should be a city s Vision Plan? How should a Region and City development plan be prepared? What is the impact of liberalization and policies like the establishment of Special Economic Zones? Can a sustainable development model be evolved in a city? Should slums be redeveloped or remodelled? Are low-cost shelter projects economically feasible for implementation in metropolitan cities? How can street vendors and hawkers be resettled in an equitable manner? Is rain harvesting practicable and implementable in large cities? How can urban floods be contained in cities closer to the sea coast? What are the optimum public transportation policies that can be evolved in metropolitan cities with multiple modes of mass transport? Are new airports, Metro rail/Monorail projects and Skywalks, absolutely essential in cities like Mumbai and can they be developed by building on existing resources without astronomical investments? How to make our cities livable? The author has answered these questions by drawing lessons from the Mumbai experience. In his 42 years association with the city as an urban development specialist, the Author has studied the issues that confront the city and suggested many solutions. His emphasis has always been to build on the existing infrastructure and make it go a long way through innovation, better design and planning, and shedding the blinds of world class city shackles that Indian politicians, bureaucrats and technocrats have bound themselves with in recent years! Some of these optimal solutions, such as the double-decker coaches for the suburban rail service; water transport to the mainland from Mumbai instead of the trans-harbor bridge, have struck positive chords in the minds of many thinking individuals. The time to plan our future cities is now.
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Prakash Madhusudan Apte, born in 1939, graduated in Architecture from M.S. University, Baroda, and completed the Masters Programme in Regional Planning in 1961, from IIT Kharagpur. He went on to study Urban Design at Naples University, Italy and also obtained a Diploma in Business Management from Bharatiya Vidya Bhavan, New Delhi. He is a Fellow of the Institute of Town Planners, India, as well as the Indian Institute of Architects. Prakash Madhusudan Apte had worked with Chandigarh Capital Project, Delhi Development Authority; and the Asansol Planning Organization. He designed the new capital of Gujarat, Gandhinagar. As Chief of Projects of Housing & Urban Development Corporation of India (HUDCO), he formulated its policies and executed housing projects. As a Senior Adviser to the Royal Government of Bhutan in 2003, he prepared a Shelter Strategy for the Capital, Thimphu. For the last 12 years he has been on the staff of the World Bank as a Consultant for the Mumbai Urban Transport Project II and the Emergency Tsunami Rehabilitation Project for Tamil Nadu. He has been a Member of the Bombay Development Plan Advisory Committee, Maharashtra Housing & Area Development Authority (MHADA); the Housing Urban Renewal & Ecology (HURE) Board of the Bombay Metropolitan Region Development Authority: the Development Plan Committee for the Vasai-Virar Region; and Governor of the Delhi School of Planning & Architecture. He has chaired and addressed national and international seminars and served as Vice-President of the Institute of Town Planners, India. He was invited as the Eisenhower Fellow from India in the field of Urban Management, by the Eisenhower Exchange Fellowships Inc USA. Prakash Apte can be reached at: apteyconsult@hotmail.com.
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