Can Chennai host a projected 10-m population by 2011?

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Chennai: Urban planners need to burn much midnight oil here. Chennai faces acute problems due to shortsighted planning, leading to a logistic logjam.

According to information available with FE, Chennai has grown very rapidly in recent years. The city area of 172 sq Km hosts five million people. The Chennai Metropolitan Area (CMA) is ten times larger (1,170 sq km)and its population is projected to grow from the current 7.5 million to touch 10 million by 2011.

The suburban towns in the CMA, extending from the city, have seen unplanned and unregulated growth, which has victimised the city area. Although city’s population growth has considerably slowed down, the centres of economic activities are located there. Consequently, most of the CMA residents commute to the city for work, shopping, entertainment, healthcare and school education. There’s more cause for haphazard development: most IT companies, newly approved deemed universities, and engineering and paramedical institutions have their base in CMA. Dozens of large omnibuses belonging to the IT companies and educational institutions ply along the congested city roads to pick-up or drop their captive commuters.

Mr MG Devsahayam, managing trustee of ‘Citizens Alliance for Sustainable Living’ (Sustain), an NGO, refers to “the serious environmental consequences such as congested transport corridors and roads, inadequate urban infrastructure, and haphazard conversion of agricultural land, water bodies and open space.”

The major stress is on water. Though Chennai receives 1,270 mm of rainfall a year; much of it is lost. Major water supply schemes like Telugu Ganga and New Veeranam render limited support. On average, public supply is less than 30 litres daily per person.

Solid waste management is another problem, in spite of privatisation of waste removal in select areas. Experiments like waste segregation at source in some pockets have shown limited success.

City planners say the problems could have been contained, had the first CMA master plan been properly implemented and the second plan made ready in time.

There’s some good news too. The government is developing an IT corridor and building a six-lane IT Expressway. The State Industries Promotion Corporation of Tamil Nadu (SIPCOT) is developing an IT park with residential quarters and township outside the city.