With climate change a reality, sponge city concept may work

Sponge city concept is neither uniquely Chinese nor new in India, given the Indian way of life where communities learnt to live with water

- SMRUTI KOPPIKAR

When it did not stop raining even on the eve of Navratri in Mumbai, well into the third week of September, worry was writ large for many in the city.

Mumbai, like other cities, has been grappling with flood management plans, climate action plans, and suchlike for about a decade now. The thrust of these, however, has been on engineering and technological solutions to combat floods or drain the rain faster or prevent waterlogging. Water pumps are now de rigueur across the city. The municipal authorities say this approach is working because even if there's waterlogging from heavy rainfall, it drains out faster than it used to.

Dhakuria to ebb away completely. Delhi's flooding spots are, of course, legendary. So are Pune's and Bengaluru'. Every city, really. This is not only about rainfall patterns shifting in the era of climate change—more intense rainfall over shorter durations has become the norm. Cities are facing the fallout of the unsustainable building model promoted from the West and embraced across the world.

In this model, the natural ecology of the city does not matter—hills are flattened out, forests are hacked, thousands of trees are axed if they are in the way of massive construction projects, water bodies are landfilled without a second thought, river floodplains are claimed as developable land and built upon, lakes are turned into sites of construction, and coastlines and marshlands are not respected. All in the name of ‘development’. There has to be another way to build cities—or rebuild them.