KOVAI'S Development

கோவையின் வளர்ச்சி - Kovai’s Development Proposal for Covai Design Competition by team CDC - 200167

கோவையின் வளர்ச்சி - Kovai’s Development Coimbatore is the second largest city of Tamil Nadu with a booming economy and a growing population and has been called the Manchester of South India. Despite being a city of such significance, Coimbatore has developed in a haphazard manner.

With the opportunity that this competition provides, our proposal has been developed to serve as a model for the rest of the city through a pilot for waste management, water supply, green and blue infrastructure, transportation network, circular economy, and business models for ecological and financial sustainability. The proposal lies on the principles of sustainable development and aligned carefully with the SDGs. We have been able to target all the 17 Goals through our 26 interventions. These interventions have been described below.

To provide a structure to the whole site and make the connected areas more accessible, we have established new road links in the site considering the existing ones. A comparison of the axial analysis of the existing and proposed links show better connectivity and integration with the new links. These new links would provide access to services such as drainage and water supply on the whole site. Along with that it’ll facilitate waste collection on the whole site. We suggest an incentivised waste segregation at source. The waste collection in slums is an issue identified in the brief, for which we suggest e-rickshaws used as collection carts.

The collected waste must be segregated and sorted for processing at the CCMC waste processing yard in the Subsite C. We aim to recover two products out of the processed waste - compost and recyclables such as plastic, paper, cloth, metal, etc. The compost can be utilised in a proposed vertical farming facility over the waste mound in Subsite A. The mound is laid out in two parts that intersperse with a playground for the children. The vertical farms function as a community farm along with a learning activity for the children. It is a potential for livelihood generation for the slum residents- some of which can maintain the farms. The second set of products from the waste processing yard - the recyclables, can be upcycled to create products that are of aesthetic and functional utility by the Self help groups composed of women of the slums. The upcycled products can be sold to earn revenue for the slum households. The centre would also have an anganwadi that also could act as a creche for the working women’s kids.

To provide the SHGs space to work we propose a skill and culture development centre in 1.7-2.2 acres of land in the total land allotted to Tamil Nadu Water Supply and Drainage Board. The rest of the land is proposed to be utilised to install Faecal Sludge Treatment Plant (FSTP). The FSTP has been proposed considering the future requirement of the sewage and septage treatment in the city given that only about a quarter of the city is connected to the sewer network while the rest is dependent on on-site containment systems.

We suggest the FSTP run by a parallel tax and discharge fee model to ensure financial sustainability. The FSTP can feed from the septic tanks of the houses and establishments of the nearby areas and the public toilets in the slums.

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கோவையின் வளர்ச்சி - Kovai’s Development Proposal for Covai Design Competition by team CDC - 200167

To augment and suffice the deficit of proper sanitation in the slum settlements, we propose two public toilets in the settlements- one near the stream, towards the north, and other in the south, near the land allotted for MGR Market relocation. Both would have lined septic tanks.

The second one is of particular interest as we two other facilities along with the public toileta community kitchen and an Amma Canteen. The community kitchen and the Amma Canteen can obtain gas generated from the biodigester-based biogas plant that can be fed by the sludge from the public toilet and the food and organic waste from the MGR vegetable market located just across the road.

Our proposal connects the MGR Market for which a new layout has been prepared, along with the stretch of land obtained from clearing the slums along the Jeeva Nagar Road. The stretch has been categorically structured to carve out open space for road widening, open green and space for hawkers and vendors to activate that road edge and promote economic activity.

A major element of the site, the sanganoor pallam stream has been restructured to create space for public activity and interaction by cleaning the banks and edge treatment by regularising the width of the stream in the North and South of the site. The edges of the stream, the riparian zone (3 metres both sides) is proposed to be planted by native plants and macrophytes over planted beds to promote water filtration and greenery. The reclaimed land has been left for soft development such as landscaping, and footpaths providing open space for activity of slum dwellers. Besides, such a development would help to mitigate future flooding events by increasing the area available for absorption of storm water. We also propose to introduce native and critical species of fishes such as guppies into the stream to clean water and abate mosquito breeding. The guppies, we hope, would also help in doing so the whole water network.

The green space and the NMT network has been identified and aligned with the existing proposal of the green network proposal by GIZ for the whole city.

For the Subsite D, we propose a town planning scheme for the vacant land identifying a land for a potential public health centre.

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