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Remote Sensing & GIS in assessing physical transformation of Bhopal city, India
Dr.Aruna Saxena
M.A.N.I.T, Bhopal, India
Arunasaxena2000@yahoo.com
Abstract
In present world scenario, the focus is on 'Sustainable Development', which is promoting a widespread awareness of the need to preserve our resources and prepare management policies at a global level. Bhopal in the state of Madhya Pradesh, is one of the many cities in India, growing at a very fast rate. In the patronage of kings and rulers, it has acquired a complex urban structure over the years. Even today, this walled city is a core area for the Capital City of Bhopal. The central part or the core has gone through unusual changes in terms of social and physical transformations. The organic extension has just sprung up and they do not follow any definite pattern but they are again very intense and interestingly follow the same housing morphology of the Walled City. The integrated Inner & outer city Community Resource Management process being outlined in this paper is a shift from the static theories evolving around the physical aspects of the city to a common ground where the 'reality' in the city is perceived as per the 'user'. The focus on the 'user' pushes into prominence the various psychological issues related to the perception and cognition of the real world and its representation in a technological medium for analysis and display. The integrated process relies more on networks and interconnection between various entities and the interaction between them in the spatial-temporal environment.
This paper assesses the capability of remote sensing & GIS in being able to monitor the physical transformation in cities and the multi-dimensional dynamic nature of the community environment. The paper also lends a fresh insight into possible extensions in the existing GIS through coupling with other techniques that can make it a more useful tool for planners, and policymakers.
Introduction
Urban areas are complex multi-dimensional systems evolving out of an interaction of multiple agents at several levels. At any given singular moment of time, several transformations may be occurring simultaneously, which every human being perceives differently and comprehends individually These individual experiences result from the perceptual and cognitive processes in the human brain that also determine the meanings that we derive from our surroundings. These perceptual processes also determine the image that is created in the human brain of the environment around us, and is a selective process influenced by our cultural and social positions. This process of formation of mental images through individual experiences and recollections is always rooted in the spatial-temporal context and by forming connections between the past and the present; it can help us in assigning values to the remains from the past and justifying the need for their continuation into the future.
The urbanization process in India, its pace of growth has accelerated over the past ninety years. The process of urban development is guided and co-ordinate by the development plan of the city. Most of the major cities of India do have development plans, but these plans are often vitiated at various stages of its implementation, mostly in qualitative terms and provision of basic facilities. In most of the sectors of development, the intent of the proposals is not adequately translated into the envisaged physical framework thus creating differentiated, disjointed and undesirable urban growth. When the demands are not met in a guided manner, illegal occupation of sites and services, land use transformation, unauthorized constructions takes place, this is where the degradation of urban environment starts of, and the issue of assessing urban transformation assume importance.
Bhopal Functional and physical form Transformation
In the case of Bhopal, these resources exist in various forms ranging from concrete physical forms to the more abstract cultural values that people may associate with a place. The walled city of Bhopal was self-contained unit governing a very small principality. The basic regional functions taking place in spaces were related to administration. This function of administration still continues but with a wide change of scale. Except for a few units, not much industrial activity could settle in Bhopal. This was the first impact on physical form of disturbances. Special mention is being made in this period because in latter half of twentieth century.
The whole country physical configuration was undergone a rapid change of urbanization and industrialization. Almost overnight, the core area had to function as the center for a whole lot of new spatial developments, with the increase in population at a tremendous rate the walled city had to assume the function of a commercial center.
Land Use and Activities of Inner-city Area
This Land use variation shows the need to integrate the preservation process with the planning and development process. As the focus has shifted from the city to the user, the goals and targets in this process have changed. An integrated planning process needs to be defined which considers the reality as perceived by the user such that the 'process' is designed with the user's expectations providing the 'pointers'.
This interface of planning has to be flexible and transparent to accommodate the change in perceptions or values through time rather than setting out rigid parameters or design constraints, which predetermine the future behavior and aspirations of the community. An understanding of the underlying spatial patterns and social systems is essential before any future interventions are carried out. This is important to avoid the dissonance that may occur in the resultant urban structure because of conflicting patterns superimposed over one another. A management plan for a city, especially for one that has strong links to the past, has to then necessarily start with understanding the transformations that have taken place in the city through time. Any planning has to evolve out of this spatial-temporal context of the city, which further emphasizes the need for the integration of a research aspect to a statistical process such as urban planning.
Application of GIS Possibilities and Limitations
GIS is a useful tool, particularly because of its capacity to support both spatial and non-spatial attributes and to combine purely representational techniques with analytical techniques. It can also be useful for handling data from diverse sources and forming links and interconnections between them. With a number of agencies and organizations involved in planning, the integrated process can well be a 'participatory process' where GIS can serve as a common platform and interface that permits data exchange and collaborative decisions. Although most data in GIS has to be geo-referenced, non-commercial solutions such as those in the environmental context are now looking at ways to integrate non geo-referenced information in GIS.
However, increasing reliance on rigid, cartographic renditions makes these maps extraneous, which can otherwise be a very useful resource for lending an insight into how perceptions of people have evolved over time. Although commercial GIS packages are still incapable of applying statistical analysis to such 'loose' representations, there have been a few recent efforts to integrate 'perceptual maps' in the process of understanding of our environs and such integrations could be made more effective by developing analytical techniques that need to be and could be applied to such cognate models.
Whether visual renditions can be converted into networks for analytical purposes in the urban context would depend on the kind of information that we seek out of them in the process. It can be highly useful if such statistical analytical packages can be linked with GIS, allowing the interchange of data that is mapped as network structure and as visual spatial representations.
GIS allows an immense possibility of data storage and retrieval. In Bhopal urban center, the level of complexity is huge and the involvement of multiple agents that influence the urban landscape demands data collection on several levels and across several dimensions. When this data needs to be manually processed, spatial and non-spatial information can be linked only by limited options, such as keys next to maps or by the use of graphical technique such as colors and symbols. Databases for managing large data sources are now being widely used, but the correlation of data from more than one source is still mostly limited due to data protection policies that exist between various organizations. GIS can provide a base for the spatial and non-spatial data to be interlinked, and developing techniques such as relational databases or object-oriented databases in GIS can realize an added advantage of linking non-spatial data across several levels. Research in the field of 'multiple views' is working towards the creation of parallel views where the same datum can be viewed across several different maps or layers of spatial information. In this instance, GIS provides the advantage of linking databases to information from maps that may be created in other software packages such as 'AutoCAD.
GIS allows for data input from such diverse sources as remote sensing, traditional cartographic maps, aerial photographs and other photographic images. It can be hoped that the data dissemination policy in India will soon be defined for less restricted data exchange and data from remote sensing and other satellite information would be easily available for commercial purposes. Most European countries have relaxed their data protection rules, which allows for better exchange of data at a global level. If historic cities are being seen as global resources and the preservation of them is to be seen as a global responsibility, then it is fair to hope for information to be much more conveniently accessible at a global level. With the Internet forming the prominent interface where most global communities interact, more and more data resources are being made available on the World Wide Web, and any GIS application in the Indian context will benefit from a flexible national policy for data dissemination allowing for greater exchange.
Bhopal Development Plan-2005
BDP-2005 conceives city of Bhopal as a network of self-contained sub-cities each containing sectors, sub-sectors and neighborhoods
MONITORING OF COMPONENTS OF FIRST PHASE of BDP 2005
( studied through IRS IC data)
Transformation Process
The dynamic change from rural to urban land use is so fast that the resultant need and complex uses coupled with shortage of land have led to speculation and increase in land values. The ever-growing difference between the demand and supplies of house sites and units coupled with B.D.A's restriction on other forms of supply and very high cost of land in the city have increased the pressure of fringe area tremendously which has given rise to proliferation of unauthorized development of land uses-residential and industries etc.
The fringe areas are generally within the jurisdiction of panchayat which has neither the financial resources nor the technical expertise to plan and manage the rapidly developing fringe. They use the municipal services without paying for it. The property and service taxes are relatively higher in the city than in the fringe area and therefore attract industries which intensifies development. Like municipal areas, panchayats have no town planning rules, sub-division regulations and rules for provision of services suited to the dynamic situation of the fringe and haphazard development takes place. Since land in the city is beyond the reach of middle/low income group people, they look for land outside the city limit.
Because of economic and speculative forces imposed on villages in the periphery of Bhopal, massive transformation in their physical form and socio cultural set up takes place, disrupting their age-old healthy relationship. After loss of agricultural land, the villagers are forced to follow urban occupations to adjust to the changing needs.
The village starts transforming itself into an urban village, whose character is determined by the type of surrounding development.
Stages of Transformation
The process of transformation of villages from rural to urban can be broadly divided into following stages:
Physical
Reduction of agricultural land holdings, increase in abadi area and concentration of urbanized land, loss of fertile agriculture land, new buildings and built forms, increase in density.
Socio Economic
Occupational change, immigration, out migration, increases in economic status of villagers but usually decrease in quality of life.
Functional
Mixed use increases change from primary to tertiary, more dependence on the parent city.
Environmental and Ecological
Decrease in open spaces and loss of rural character resource base drastically changes traditional sources of water are overloaded or lost. Consequently, villagers are forced to buy food grains rather than to grow.
Findings
Organizational Setup
A monitoring cell can be introduced as the apes of all. Effective monitoring system using of remote sensing and GIS would ensure the judicious use of limited resources, helpful in highlighting the true picture of status of land for public usage, protection of prime agricultural land, control of sub-urban sprawl, control of growth, provision of adequate services.
The monitoring cell should ensure the proper information flow between the development agencies of Bhopal.
Conclusions
Plans are afloat to use GIS as a tool for the preparation of the next Master Plan in Bhopal. The application GIS will probably involve immense upheavals in organizational and financial terms. However, it has to be realized that an optimum use of this application cannot be achieved unless the benefits that are we hope to derive from it are clearly defined. This will need a two-step methodology. Firstly, the aims and objectives have to be clearly defined for the project and a full review of the limitations of the presently employed techniques must be conducted. Secondly, GIS has to then be assessed to see how it can be used to derive maximum benefit from it, and the changes that would be needed in the present scenario in turn to help derive these benefits.
References
© GISdevelopment.net. All rights reserved.
Dr.Aruna Saxena
M.A.N.I.T, Bhopal, India
Arunasaxena2000@yahoo.com
Abstract
In present world scenario, the focus is on 'Sustainable Development', which is promoting a widespread awareness of the need to preserve our resources and prepare management policies at a global level. Bhopal in the state of Madhya Pradesh, is one of the many cities in India, growing at a very fast rate. In the patronage of kings and rulers, it has acquired a complex urban structure over the years. Even today, this walled city is a core area for the Capital City of Bhopal. The central part or the core has gone through unusual changes in terms of social and physical transformations. The organic extension has just sprung up and they do not follow any definite pattern but they are again very intense and interestingly follow the same housing morphology of the Walled City. The integrated Inner & outer city Community Resource Management process being outlined in this paper is a shift from the static theories evolving around the physical aspects of the city to a common ground where the 'reality' in the city is perceived as per the 'user'. The focus on the 'user' pushes into prominence the various psychological issues related to the perception and cognition of the real world and its representation in a technological medium for analysis and display. The integrated process relies more on networks and interconnection between various entities and the interaction between them in the spatial-temporal environment.
This paper assesses the capability of remote sensing & GIS in being able to monitor the physical transformation in cities and the multi-dimensional dynamic nature of the community environment. The paper also lends a fresh insight into possible extensions in the existing GIS through coupling with other techniques that can make it a more useful tool for planners, and policymakers.
Introduction
Urban areas are complex multi-dimensional systems evolving out of an interaction of multiple agents at several levels. At any given singular moment of time, several transformations may be occurring simultaneously, which every human being perceives differently and comprehends individually These individual experiences result from the perceptual and cognitive processes in the human brain that also determine the meanings that we derive from our surroundings. These perceptual processes also determine the image that is created in the human brain of the environment around us, and is a selective process influenced by our cultural and social positions. This process of formation of mental images through individual experiences and recollections is always rooted in the spatial-temporal context and by forming connections between the past and the present; it can help us in assigning values to the remains from the past and justifying the need for their continuation into the future.
The urbanization process in India, its pace of growth has accelerated over the past ninety years. The process of urban development is guided and co-ordinate by the development plan of the city. Most of the major cities of India do have development plans, but these plans are often vitiated at various stages of its implementation, mostly in qualitative terms and provision of basic facilities. In most of the sectors of development, the intent of the proposals is not adequately translated into the envisaged physical framework thus creating differentiated, disjointed and undesirable urban growth. When the demands are not met in a guided manner, illegal occupation of sites and services, land use transformation, unauthorized constructions takes place, this is where the degradation of urban environment starts of, and the issue of assessing urban transformation assume importance.
Bhopal Functional and physical form Transformation
In the case of Bhopal, these resources exist in various forms ranging from concrete physical forms to the more abstract cultural values that people may associate with a place. The walled city of Bhopal was self-contained unit governing a very small principality. The basic regional functions taking place in spaces were related to administration. This function of administration still continues but with a wide change of scale. Except for a few units, not much industrial activity could settle in Bhopal. This was the first impact on physical form of disturbances. Special mention is being made in this period because in latter half of twentieth century.
The whole country physical configuration was undergone a rapid change of urbanization and industrialization. Almost overnight, the core area had to function as the center for a whole lot of new spatial developments, with the increase in population at a tremendous rate the walled city had to assume the function of a commercial center.
Land Use and Activities of Inner-city Area
This Land use variation shows the need to integrate the preservation process with the planning and development process. As the focus has shifted from the city to the user, the goals and targets in this process have changed. An integrated planning process needs to be defined which considers the reality as perceived by the user such that the 'process' is designed with the user's expectations providing the 'pointers'.
This interface of planning has to be flexible and transparent to accommodate the change in perceptions or values through time rather than setting out rigid parameters or design constraints, which predetermine the future behavior and aspirations of the community. An understanding of the underlying spatial patterns and social systems is essential before any future interventions are carried out. This is important to avoid the dissonance that may occur in the resultant urban structure because of conflicting patterns superimposed over one another. A management plan for a city, especially for one that has strong links to the past, has to then necessarily start with understanding the transformations that have taken place in the city through time. Any planning has to evolve out of this spatial-temporal context of the city, which further emphasizes the need for the integration of a research aspect to a statistical process such as urban planning.
Application of GIS Possibilities and Limitations
GIS is a useful tool, particularly because of its capacity to support both spatial and non-spatial attributes and to combine purely representational techniques with analytical techniques. It can also be useful for handling data from diverse sources and forming links and interconnections between them. With a number of agencies and organizations involved in planning, the integrated process can well be a 'participatory process' where GIS can serve as a common platform and interface that permits data exchange and collaborative decisions. Although most data in GIS has to be geo-referenced, non-commercial solutions such as those in the environmental context are now looking at ways to integrate non geo-referenced information in GIS.
However, increasing reliance on rigid, cartographic renditions makes these maps extraneous, which can otherwise be a very useful resource for lending an insight into how perceptions of people have evolved over time. Although commercial GIS packages are still incapable of applying statistical analysis to such 'loose' representations, there have been a few recent efforts to integrate 'perceptual maps' in the process of understanding of our environs and such integrations could be made more effective by developing analytical techniques that need to be and could be applied to such cognate models.
Whether visual renditions can be converted into networks for analytical purposes in the urban context would depend on the kind of information that we seek out of them in the process. It can be highly useful if such statistical analytical packages can be linked with GIS, allowing the interchange of data that is mapped as network structure and as visual spatial representations.
GIS allows an immense possibility of data storage and retrieval. In Bhopal urban center, the level of complexity is huge and the involvement of multiple agents that influence the urban landscape demands data collection on several levels and across several dimensions. When this data needs to be manually processed, spatial and non-spatial information can be linked only by limited options, such as keys next to maps or by the use of graphical technique such as colors and symbols. Databases for managing large data sources are now being widely used, but the correlation of data from more than one source is still mostly limited due to data protection policies that exist between various organizations. GIS can provide a base for the spatial and non-spatial data to be interlinked, and developing techniques such as relational databases or object-oriented databases in GIS can realize an added advantage of linking non-spatial data across several levels. Research in the field of 'multiple views' is working towards the creation of parallel views where the same datum can be viewed across several different maps or layers of spatial information. In this instance, GIS provides the advantage of linking databases to information from maps that may be created in other software packages such as 'AutoCAD.
GIS allows for data input from such diverse sources as remote sensing, traditional cartographic maps, aerial photographs and other photographic images. It can be hoped that the data dissemination policy in India will soon be defined for less restricted data exchange and data from remote sensing and other satellite information would be easily available for commercial purposes. Most European countries have relaxed their data protection rules, which allows for better exchange of data at a global level. If historic cities are being seen as global resources and the preservation of them is to be seen as a global responsibility, then it is fair to hope for information to be much more conveniently accessible at a global level. With the Internet forming the prominent interface where most global communities interact, more and more data resources are being made available on the World Wide Web, and any GIS application in the Indian context will benefit from a flexible national policy for data dissemination allowing for greater exchange.
Bhopal Development Plan-2005
BDP-2005 conceives city of Bhopal as a network of self-contained sub-cities each containing sectors, sub-sectors and neighborhoods
MONITORING OF COMPONENTS OF FIRST PHASE of BDP 2005
( studied through IRS IC data)
Transformation Process
The dynamic change from rural to urban land use is so fast that the resultant need and complex uses coupled with shortage of land have led to speculation and increase in land values. The ever-growing difference between the demand and supplies of house sites and units coupled with B.D.A's restriction on other forms of supply and very high cost of land in the city have increased the pressure of fringe area tremendously which has given rise to proliferation of unauthorized development of land uses-residential and industries etc.
The fringe areas are generally within the jurisdiction of panchayat which has neither the financial resources nor the technical expertise to plan and manage the rapidly developing fringe. They use the municipal services without paying for it. The property and service taxes are relatively higher in the city than in the fringe area and therefore attract industries which intensifies development. Like municipal areas, panchayats have no town planning rules, sub-division regulations and rules for provision of services suited to the dynamic situation of the fringe and haphazard development takes place. Since land in the city is beyond the reach of middle/low income group people, they look for land outside the city limit.
Because of economic and speculative forces imposed on villages in the periphery of Bhopal, massive transformation in their physical form and socio cultural set up takes place, disrupting their age-old healthy relationship. After loss of agricultural land, the villagers are forced to follow urban occupations to adjust to the changing needs.
The village starts transforming itself into an urban village, whose character is determined by the type of surrounding development.
Stages of Transformation
The process of transformation of villages from rural to urban can be broadly divided into following stages:
- Rural - Predominantly agricultural land use.
- Transitional
Pretransitional - Gradual change starts in rural character.
Transition - It can be categorized under urban extension.
Post transition - Becomes almost part and parcel of urban area. - Urban
- Unplanned development.
- Protection of environmental and ecological quality at the peripheries.
- Provision of infrastructure facilities.
- Legal problem
Physical
Reduction of agricultural land holdings, increase in abadi area and concentration of urbanized land, loss of fertile agriculture land, new buildings and built forms, increase in density.
Socio Economic
Occupational change, immigration, out migration, increases in economic status of villagers but usually decrease in quality of life.
Functional
Mixed use increases change from primary to tertiary, more dependence on the parent city.
Environmental and Ecological
Decrease in open spaces and loss of rural character resource base drastically changes traditional sources of water are overloaded or lost. Consequently, villagers are forced to buy food grains rather than to grow.
Findings
- Major land use- Residential converted to commercial in old city.
- Rigid nature of development plan & lack of monitoring mechanism for physical transformation could not guide development in planned manner
- Unplanned Development occurred under reduced legal control.
- Because of lack of applicability of constructional rules the built form has achieved higher far 's
- Master plan Proposals are not based on ground realities
- Lack of provision of infrastructure and basic amenities.
Organizational Setup
A monitoring cell can be introduced as the apes of all. Effective monitoring system using of remote sensing and GIS would ensure the judicious use of limited resources, helpful in highlighting the true picture of status of land for public usage, protection of prime agricultural land, control of sub-urban sprawl, control of growth, provision of adequate services.
The monitoring cell should ensure the proper information flow between the development agencies of Bhopal.
Conclusions
Plans are afloat to use GIS as a tool for the preparation of the next Master Plan in Bhopal. The application GIS will probably involve immense upheavals in organizational and financial terms. However, it has to be realized that an optimum use of this application cannot be achieved unless the benefits that are we hope to derive from it are clearly defined. This will need a two-step methodology. Firstly, the aims and objectives have to be clearly defined for the project and a full review of the limitations of the presently employed techniques must be conducted. Secondly, GIS has to then be assessed to see how it can be used to derive maximum benefit from it, and the changes that would be needed in the present scenario in turn to help derive these benefits.
References
- Alexander, Ian,C.,City center pattern and problems
- Agarwal, P.,” GIS in Cultural Resource Management in Historic Urban Centers”.
- Chorea, Joseph De., and Koppelman Lee, Planning design Criteria, New York
- Harder C, 1998, Serving Maps on the Internet: Geographic Information on the world wide web; ESRI press