Rivers, Cities and People

The book looks at recent initiatives for river restoration and riverfront intended to contribute to making Asian cities clean, resilient and investment worthy.

This book looks at recent initiatives for river restoration and riverfront development intended to contribute to making Asian cities resilient, inclusive and less polluted. It uses an interdisciplinary perspective to assert that insufficient consideration of social issues in the planning and management of urban riverscapes leads to social exclusion. Utilising diverse entry points and theoretical orientations, every chapter of the volume contributes to the exploration of the way urban river restoration is entwined with questions around urban citizenship, violation of international housing rights, poverty and vulnerability, livelihoods and the use of common property resources. It explores the social aspects of well-known cases and examples of river restoration projects from Asian megacities such as Lahore, Dhaka, Chennai, Ahmedabad, Bangkok, Manila and secondary cities in India. While touching on the technical, ecological and recreational aspects of urban river restoration and riverfront development, the book focuses on social issues related to displacement, contestations around land and water, the right to adequate housing and the interconnected rights to livelihoods, health and food security.Enriched with empirical evidence and theoretical underpinnings, this book will be useful for students, teachers and researchers of urban studies, urban geography, urban planning, urban ecology, sociology, community development and policy and governance. It will also provide valuable case material for practitioners in those disciplines.

Autorentext

Maartje van Eerd is Assistant Professor and Senior Specialist in Housing and Social Development, the Institute for Housing and Urban Development Studies (IHS), Erasmus University, Rotterdam, the Netherlands.

Banashree Banerjee is Senior Specialist in Housing and Urban Management, Institute for Housing and Urban Development Studies (IHS), Erasmus University, Rotterdam, the Netherlands.

Inhalt

Chapter 1 Introduction Part 1: Different cities, distinct rivers, similar social challenges Chapter 2 The Promise of One Safe Future for the Oplan Likas Resettled Families of Metro Manila Chapter 3 A Tale of Two Cities: Restoration of Bangkok's Waterways in a "Post-Amphibious" Setting Chapter 4 Social and Environmental Impacts of Urbanization in Indian Non-Metros: Evidence from Tamil Nadu Chapter 5 Learning from Urban Riverfront Development: Revisiting the Sabarmati Model Chapter 6 The River as Habitat: The Ravi as a Site of Collaboration between People, Ecologies, and Human Agency Chapter 7 Revitalization of the Blue Network of Dhaka: Social Responsibility of Planning Approaches and Practices Part 2: River restoration and waterfront development in Chennai Chapter 8 An Introduction to Forced Evictions along Rivers in Chennai and its impacts on women and children Chapter 9 Where is the river? How a depoliticized restructuring of riverfront land uses builds differentiated entitlements and benefits from land resources Chapter 10 Mapping the information and communication lacunae in river front development induced evictions and resettlement in Chennai