million cities

1. Million cities
City and Metropolitan
Planning
PAVAN H K
4TH SEM
Mtech in URP
UNIVERSITY OF MYSORE

2. Introduction
1. Million City: A city with at least 1 million inhabitants.
2. In 1805, there was only one city in the world with one million people, in 1905 there
were three, and by 2005, there are 281 million-plus cities. In just 200 years, the
world’s population has grown from being mostly rural to nearly half of the 6.5
billion people now living in urban areas.

4. 1. In the early 1800s, London became the first million-plus city
2. By the early 1900s, Paris and New York had joined the million-plus club
3. The geographic pattern of today’s 281 million-plus cities is very interesting, with
the preponderance occurring in the middle latitudes.
4. Tokyo was the largest with 34 million, followed by Mexico City (18), New York
City (18), Sao
5. Paulo (17), Mumbai (Bombay) (16), Kolkata (Calcutta) (13), Shanghai (13),
Buenos Aires (13), Delhi (12), Los Angeles (12), Osaka (11), Jakarta (11), Beijing
(11), Rio de Janerio (11), and Cairo (10) (2005 World Amanac).

5. List of million-plus cities in India

9. 1. The process of urbanisation and the rapid increase in the population provides
enormous pressure on the surrounding environment. A million city, on an average,
daily requires 6, 25,000 tones of water, 2,000 tons of food grains, and 9,500 tons of
fuel.
2. Similarly it daily generates about 5, 00,000 tones of polluted water, 2,000 tones of
solid waste and 950 tones of air pollutants whose disposal is a major problem for
civic authorities.
3. Hence, a city puts dual impact over its surroundings.

10. Problem of Space
1. Cities constantly require more and more space for their growth. This demand for
space is met by colonizing fringe or rural areas. But sometimes due to physical and
other constraints this expansion is obstructed. The island nature of Mumbai and
occurrence of salt water lakes in the eastern periphery of Kolkata are causing such
problems.
2. Also there is general tendency in city dwellers, especially in those urban areas in
which internal transport is not cheap and efficient, to live closer to their place of
work or business establishments. City planners lot different sectors for industrial,
residential and commercial requirements which soon become overcrowded and
congested.
3. This leads to enormous increase in land values and rents which make the living of
poor people difficult and painful. Many of Idiom, who are not able to pay high rent,
are thus forced to live in slums and squatter settlements which is a great slur on the
face of modern civic society.
4. According to the United Nations, the proportion of urban dwellers living
in slums decreased from 47 percent to 37 percent in the developing world between
1990 and 2005. However, due to rising population, the absolute number of slum
dwellers is rising.

11. Residential Problem
1. Urban population, particularly in developing countries, is rising at terrific rate which
is leading to shortage of houses and residences. According to one estimate there is
annual shortage of about 1.7 million houses in Indian cities. This has led to
phenomenal rise in house rent and many families are compelled to spend 30 to 50
per cent of their monthly income in hiring residential accommodations.
2. This has also forced low income group people to live in slums or occupy foot-paths
and road pavements. The number of such slum and pavement dwellers is rising by
leaps and bounds in metropolitan cities like Mumbai, Kolkata and Delhi etc.
3. In 2002, research showed that children and families were the largest growing
segment of the homeless population in the United States, and this has presented new
challenges, especially in services, to agencies. In the USA, the government asked
many major cities to come up with a ten-year plan to end homelessness.

12. Problem of Transport
1. Transport bottleneck and traffic congestion are major problems of the Indian cities.
Amongst all cities of the country Delhi is better placed in respect of road transport.
But most of the city roads are carrying higher traffic than their actual capacity. Here
main roads carry 6,000 PCU per hour which increases to 12,000 PCU during peak
hours.
2. If the number of vehicles are allowed to increase at present rate without upgrading
the roads the whole system of capital's transport is bound to collapse. Already with
the rising pressure of traffic there is jam and traffic bottleneck in several localities of
the old city and the causalities in road accidents are mounting at alarming rate.
3. In Kolkata despite the construction of metro rail and Vivekanand Setup the
congestion in many old localities and near Haora bridge is a daily routine. In
Ahmadabad the speed of vehicles drops down to 5 km/hour on Gandhi Marg and
Relief Marg due to congestion and overcrowding.
4. The Texas Transportation Institute estimated that, in 2000, the 75 largest
metropolitan areas experienced 3.6 billion vehicle-hours of delay, resulting in 5.7
billion U.S. gallons (21.6 billion liters) in wasted fuel and $67.5 billion in lost
productivity, or about 0.7% of the nation's GDP.

13. Problem of Water Supply
1. Water is life and man cannot subsist without water.
2. The average per head per day consumption of water in Kolkata is 272 liters, in Mumbai 190
liters, and in Delhi 90 liters (cf. Los Angeles 1,200 liters, Chicago 1,058 liters and London
200 liters).
3. Central Public Health and Environmental Engineering Organisation (CPHEEO) has fixed up
125-200 liters of water per head per day for cities with a population of more than 50,000;
100-125 liters for population between 10,000 and 50,000; and 70-100 liters for population
below 10,000.
4. To meet this growing demand of water, city administration is tapping external sources of
water supply. Mumbai draws its water from sources located at 29-120 km away from the city.
Chennai uses water express trains to meet its growing demands. Hyderabad collects its water
from Nagarjun Sagar barrage (137 km), and Bangalore from Kaveri River (100 km).

14. Problem of Urban Pollution
1. The problem of air pollution has assumed serious proportions in the metropolitan
cities. Delhi, Kolkata and Chennai have already been rated 4th, 6th and 13th among
the 41 most polluted megacities of the world in view of suspended particulate
matter (SPM) concentrations.
2. About 52 per cent of the total pollution load in Mumbai is contributed by vehicles.
About 48 per cent of SO2 emissions come from industries and 33 percent from
power plants. Besides, noxious fumes emanating from garbage dumps has also
become a major cause of concern in the big cities.

15. Problem of Urban Pollution
3. In Delhi transport sector causes 60 per cent of the air pollution. Here more than 11
lakh registered vehicles per day generate about 250 tons of carbon mono- oxide,
400 tones of hydro-carbon, 6 tons of sulphur dioxide and heavy quantity of SPM.
Kolkata metropolis daily releases about 1305 tons of pollutants in the atmosphere.
Of these industrial establishments contribute 600 tones, transport sector 360 tones,
thermal power stations 195 tones, and domestic kitchens 150 tones.
4. Smog is caused by large amounts of coal burning, which creates a mixture of
smoke and sulfur dioxide. World coal consumption was about 6,743,786,000 short
tons in 2006 and is expected to increase 48% to 9.98 billion short tons by
2030. The USA consumes about 14% of the world total, using 90% of it for
generation of electricity.

16. Water Pollution
1. Water pollution, in cities, is caused by the mixing of sewage waste water in the
sources of drinking water supply and pipe lines.
2. Majority of the Indian cities do not have adequate water treatment facilities, as a
result of which sewage and waste water is allowed to flow to the rivers and lakes
which supply drinking water to the city.
3. Sizeable populations of slum dwellers do not have lavatories in their homes and
use open spaces, wherever available, as latrines. This poses serious health hazards.
4. The skeptic tanks of the individual houses also pollute the ground water which is
another source of water supply for the urban dwellers.
5. The chemicals used by the farmers in the agricultural fields of the fringe areas also
get collected in the river water during rains.
6. Waste untreated industrial water from urban industries also flow to the river and
pollutes its water.

17. Noise Pollution
1. Noise pollution is increasing with growing urbanization and
industrialization in developing countries like India. Most of the million
cities of India are facing the problem of this pollution due to phenomenal
growth in the number of automobiles, factories, mills, blaring sounds of
loudspeakers and hustles and bustles of crowded market places.
2. Most of the big cities of the country suffer from high level of noise
pollution, generally above 70 dB, e.g., Chennai 89 dB, Mumbai 85 dB,
Delhi 89 dB, Kolkata 87 dB, Kochi 80 dB, Madurai and Kanpur 75 dB
each, and Thiruvananthapuram 70 dB. Most of these cities either do not
have sufficient laws to check noise pollution or law enforcing authorities
do not muster courage to take suitable penal action against law breakers.

18. Solid Waste
1. Amount of such solid wastes is increasing at alarming rate in Indian cities due to
phenomenal rise in their population, greater attraction of urban youngsters towards
material and consumer culture based on use and throw method and lack of
perception on the part of urbanites.
2. Mumbai metropolis produces 4,400 tons of garbage per day which is collected
through 16,000 municipal workers and 270 trucks. It is disposed off at three
dumping sites viz. Deonar, Malad and Dhanwari Mohan Creek.
3. Kolkata metropolitan area daily generates about 4,000 tones of solid wastes, only
70 per cent of which is disposed off by the municipal authorities.
4. Same quantity of urban waste is generated by the national capital (Delhi) whose
disposal is done in Jaipur, Ghazipur, Mandi and Bhatti areas.
5. Kanpur and Lucknow urban areas have a daily output of 1,000 and 900 tons of
garbage of which roughly one-third remains uncollected by civic authorities.

19. Problem of Urban Crimes
1. Increasing urban crimes are disturbing the peace and tranquility of the modern
cities.
2. Dutt and Venugopal (1983) have made attempt to analyse the spatial pattern of
crimes in urban centers of India. According to this urban crimes like rape, murder,
kidnapping, robbery etc are more pronounced in the north' central parts of the
country.
3. Interestingly, economic crimes (theft, ching and criminal breach of trust) in cities
are concentrated in the north central region of the country.
4. Poverty related crimes are widespread and there is a single small focus of
concentration in eastern India
5. (Dutt, A. K. et at, 1966, pp. 81-82).

20. Strengths and weakness
1. They are one single area in a very fundamental sense: they constitute a complex unit
of production, a single labor market and a specific system of power, beyond their
extreme cultural and social differentiation.
2. Million Cities are the directional centers, the centers for technological innovation.
3. metropolitan areas are major contributors to national economies and play a key role
as nodes in global markets.
4. They are the most poignant expressions of our social contradictions and social
problems.
5. The sites of extreme poverty and neglect, the shop floor of crime and violence, the
locus of human abuse and human destruction.

21. Policies
1. Enhance the city’s economic competitiveness and attractiveness;
2. Improve the policies put in place to strengthen social inclusion and environmental
sustainability;
3. Assess the city’s environmental performance and its vulnerability to climate change,
and explore ways in which environmental and economic development policies can
foster more sustainable development; and
4. Identify obstacles to competitiveness and sustainable development within the
spheres of governance and local finance, and make recommendations for
overcoming them.

22. References:
1. People & the Planet, “Greening the Cities,” Vol. 5, No. 2, 1996; The World Almanac and
Book of Facts, 2005, World Almanac Education Group, Inc.
2. Press information Bureau Government of India.
3. Short essay on the Problems faced by modern cities in India
4. Urban Floods, Case study of Bangalore, Indian Institute of Science, Bangalore – 560 012,
5. Case study, Kolkata, India, by Nitai Kundu, Institute of Wetland Management & Ecological
Design

23. THANK YOU