Students look to build citizens' relationship with Mutha river

PUNE: Students of the city-based Bhanuben Nanavati College of Architecture (BNCA) have submitted a proposal to municipal commissioner Mahesh Zagade to transform the Mutha river flowing through the city into a lifeline of the city, instead of being just a waste carrier.
A workshop was conducted by the BNCA to initiate discussions among the students and to involve them in solving problems of the city.It was part of the action component of the Healthy Cities workshop conducted by the BNCA last week, where the proposal was submitted to the municipal commissioner.
Shubhada Kamalapurkar, head of the department of landscape architecture, BNCA, told TOI that one of the reasons behind taking rivers as study component was because the organisation felt a need to look at the planning of the urban river system with a different approach.
"Under the theme of healthy cities, we began with the premise that the river that flows through the city needs to be studied, understood and planned as a first step towards healthy cities. Riverine ecosystems have undergone a shift from being a lifeline of any settlement to becoming waste water gutters," Kamalapurkar said. She added that conventional water systems and treatments to urban rivers that municipal authorities have attempted have failed.
Fifty students participated in the workshop which was initiated in September 2010. The students were divided into five groups to work on different stretches of the Mutha river, namely, from Rajaram bridge to Mhatre bridge, Mhatre bridge to Lakadi pul, Lakadi pul to Balgandharva bridge, Balgandharva bridge to Shivaji bridge and Shivaji bridge to Sangam bridge. They were provided guidance by national and international experts in the field, as well as the BNCA faculty.
Later, two of the five groups were awarded prizes and their proposals were submitted to the PMC.
Purva Keskar, head of environmental design and planning department at BNCA, who headed the workshop, told TOI: "The winning group looked at building a relationship between the citizens and the river. Another proposal was about not adding anything to the space around the river, but to work at regenerating the biodiversity," Keskar said.
She explained that the main idea behind the proposals was to get people actively participate in regenerating the river. "One of the important proposals made was to develop the river as a public space. Therefore one suggestion was to make the river accessible to people. Of course, safety measures should be in place," Keskar said.
"The primary concerns and underpinning values considered by the students when evolving their proposal were maintaining the natural flows and topography, quality of the river edge, skyline and interface, biodiversity, water quality, river as an open space, cultural associations and livelihoods," Keskar added.