[sustran] Low-cost transport is vital to affordable housing – and a Bus Rapid Transit System is the best bet

[Vinay Baindur]

https://scroll.in/article/837672/low-cost-transport-is-vital-to-affordable-housing-and-a-bus-rapid-transit-system-is-the-best-bet


Low-cost transport is vital to affordable housing – and a Bus Rapid Transit
System is the best betLocalities with mixed-income groups, residential and
commercial units are popular across the world and can work for India
too.[image:
Low-cost transport is vital to affordable housing – and a Bus Rapid Transit
System is the best bet]Danish Siddiqui/Reuters
May 19, 2017 · 10:30 am
Shirish B Patel <https://scroll.in/author/13211> ,  Oormi Kapadia
<https://scroll.in/author/13212>  &  Jasmine Saluja

Affordable housing will find no buyers unless it comes with high-speed,
low-cost transit connections.

Our urban population will expand dramatically, so it should be obvious that
city footprints must also expand. “Going vertical” in a city like Mumbai,
already one of the world’s densest, is no solution. All it does is multiply
congestion and degrade quality of life without affecting property prices –
those are determined by market demand and, as we have seen, higher floor
space index (which determines the buildable area on a plot) automatically
means higher land prices. Only new land, opened up with new rapid transit
links, can help attenuate land prices.

Expanding the city’s footprint should not be confused with urban sprawl.
That comes with the automobile and low-density living. Instead, we propose
expansion into dense settlements efficiently served by public transport.
Besides accommodating new arrivals, such settlements could improve living
conditions in existing congested areas by attracting away some residents.
Goals for development

We want a zero-subsidy framework, to make such projects easily replicable.
Development would then have to be mixed-use, with jobs as well as homes,
and mixed-income, so that we can have a cross-subsidy (charging higher
prices to one group to subsidise lower prices for another) in land cost
and, consequently, affordability across all income groups. Housing of
different sizes would be for as wide a range of income groups as possible –
on separate plots if need be, but within the same locality. Providing
housing for all, including the lowest income groups in proportion to their
presence in the population, is the only way to avoid slums. Such
mixed-income housing across a locality is mandated in Spain and Ireland,
and enabled in many countries, including England, France, the United States
and Canada. With shared amenities – schools, parks, medical facilities –
this makes for a more egalitarian social mix and, very likely, a more
peaceful society than one with ghettos for the poor in one location and
gated communities for the rich at another. The mixed-income, mixed-use
arrangement also reduces commuting, because many lower level service jobs
will be in the households or activity centres of the better off within the
same locality.

We suggest the following principles to guide development:

   1. Proportionate representation of every income group across the city in
   the housing, plus as many jobs as there are resident workers – although,
   admittedly, many such local jobs may be filled by non-residents and many
   residents will work outside.
   2. A public transit-oriented development with strict segregation of
   transit from normal traffic – to guarantee high-speed transit.
   3. Uniform net plot densities for all income groups.
   4. A cross-subsidy in land prices across income groups follows
   automatically with uniform densities of dwelling units per hectare across
   income groups, but different limits for buildable area, more for
   higher-income plots, less for lower income, and exactions of payment for
   land proportionate to income.

Going the BRTS way

The cheapest and most readily expandable feeder system would be a Bus Rapid
Transit System on an exclusive two-lane roadway track, with overtaking
lanes at platforms spaced 700 meters apart. For high speed and capacity, it
must mimic a railway system – boarding and alighting on platforms that are
flush with the floor of the vehicle, wide vehicle doors that allow quick
passenger discharge and boarding, and ticketed access to platforms to
minimise en-route delays. Such a system is not a regular bus system. As in
a railway, the vehicles and the roadway would be exclusive to the Bus Rapid
Transit System, never mixed with other traffic.

Assuming such a system serves people residing within 500 meters on either
side, a 10-km Bus Rapid Transit System loop would open up about 10 square
km (1,000 hectares) of land for new development.

To attract ridership, the headway between Bus Rapid Transit System vehicles
should never exceed, say, 10 minutes, and two minutes or less at peak
hours. Vehicles may be smaller when the settlement is sparsely inhabited,
larger as demand builds. Average speed, including stops, should exceed 25
km per hour.

To achieve this average speed, the system must have exclusive right-of-way
without intersections. All other traffic must be grade separated, crossing
below or above the ground-level Bus Rapid Transit System. Keeping it at
ground level minimises initial investment in the track and platforms. Only
at the railway station would the Bus Rapid Transit System be lifted to
discharge passengers directly on the footbridge crossing the railway
tracks. This would thus, free up the ground immediately outside the station
for other vehicular traffic.

A pedestrian underpass at every stop on the Bus Rapid Transit System would
provide access to its island platforms. This underpass would be widened at
alternate platforms so cars can also cross under the system. Heavier
vehicles would use shallow-rise overbridges spaced every few kilometers,
just high enough to clear single-decker vehicles below. The road network
for cars and other motorised vehicles through the development would thus be
completely separated from the ground-level Bus Rapid Transit System.

Apart from being fast and reliable, the Bus Rapid Transit System also needs
to be cheap. This almost certainly implies a subsidy, whose source should
be a carefully considered progressive tariff independent of the ticket cost
to travellers. Those who frown at subsidies should know that bus systems
around the world are subsidised, and that this is amply justified by their
contribution to reduction in traffic congestion and air pollution.
Financial viability

For replicability, the proposed development must be self-financing, with no
call for external subsidies. So we must recover from occupants the cost of
land, physical and social infrastructure, and construction of their own
homes at a price they can afford. International practice recognises four
years’ income for a household as an acceptable standard for housing
affordability.
[image: Table 1: Affordable land cost with four years' income from 1,000
households.]Table 1: Affordable land cost with four years' income from
1,000 households.

Based on the income profile of Mumbai, Column 1 in Table 1 shows ranges of
monthly household income, and Column 2 the percentage population in each
income range (we exclude the 4% that forms the highest income bracket as
irrelevant to the scheme). Column 3 is four years’ income for each
category, that is, Column 1 multiplied by 48 months. Column 4 suggests
house sizes for each income category, based on what in Mumbai would be
generally acceptable. We assume construction costs vary by income category
from Rs 18,000 per square meter to Rs 24,000 per square meter, and Rs
20,000 per square meter as the cost for workers’ spaces. Cost of
construction is in Column 5. Column 6, the difference between Columns 4 and
5, represents the surplus after construction available per household in
each income group to pay for land and infrastructure.

We convert fractions in Column 2 to absolute numbers in each income group
for every 1,000 households, and multiplying by the surplus per household in
Column 6, Column 7 shows the surplus generated by each income category.

We do not want a purely residential development. Intermingled jobs would be
desirable. The employment ratio in Mumbai is 40%. So we provide for a
commensurate number of jobs. The resident population itself will generate
many lower-income jobs, ideally taken up by residents to minimise transport
costs. We should not inhibit the mixing of residences and zero-nuisance
businesses in the same building, or be too rigid about proportions of
residential to work space – let the market decide that, and keep planning
flexible enough to accommodate variations. To calculate area requirements
and construction costs, we assume a 9 square meter built-up area per job
and a floor area ratio (the ratio of a building’s total floor area to the
size of the plot) of 1, which allows for a mix of single- and
multi-storeyed construction.

In Table 1, Rows 1 to 6 are for residential construction. Row 7 concerns
construction of work places. Row 7, Column 2 shows the percentage of each
household that is employed. Assuming Mumbai’s average household size of 4.5
persons, with an employment floor space requirement of 9 square meters per
worker, 40 square meters is required for 4.5 workers (Row 7, Column 3).
Since we are calculating per household, we might think of this as “workers’
spaces” for computational purposes, with each accommodating 4.5 workers (as
in a household). The affordable value for this (Row 7, Column 4) is based
on current business property prices per square meter at sites just north of
Greater Mumbai.

>From our 1,000 households, each paying four years’ household income, after
paying for all construction, we have a surplus of Rs 190 crores. The
additional 400 workers’ spaces also generate a surplus, the difference
between market price and construction cost. The total surplus is about Rs
317 crores for every 1,000 households (with their 400 associated workers’
spaces), available to pay for land and physical and social infrastructure.
Land required

We assume a within-plot density of 270 households per hectare. In the
successful 30-year-old Charkop housing project in Mumbai, density in
low-income areas is 278 households per hectare, which would still be
considered acceptable.

An important assumption here is that the same density applies across income
groups, so wealthier residents consuming more floor area will live in
taller buildings. Moreover, each household consumes the same land area.
Since we are taking four years’ income from every household, the wealthier
are paying more per unit of land – a cross-subsidy – and land per se is
differentially priced across income groups. This can be justified in many
ways, including attractiveness of location or building regulations, say,
that might limit the volume of permissible construction or deny motor car
access or parking to the lower income locations. Or the charge for land
could be uniform per unit of built-up floor space, and with uniform
densities this would painlessly deliver the desired cross-subsidy.

Allowing 30% of the total area for roads and rapid transit, 4% for
institutions (schools and hospitals), 13% for parks (based on a minimum of
3 square meters per capita, low but acceptable in Mumbai) we are left with
53% for buildable plots, mainly residential but with shops and offices
allowed.

Our land area requirement then works out to just over 10 hectares for 1,000
households and 400 workers’ spaces. The gross residential density of the
development would be about 100 households per hectare. Assuming Mumbai’s
family size of 4.5, this is 450 persons per hectare.

>From the surplus, we have in hand Rs 317.5 crores (see Table 1). Deducting
the cost of the Bus Rapid Transit System (Rs 0.3 crores per hectare),
physical infrastructure (Rs 2.4 crores per hectare), social infrastructure
(Rs 2 crores per hectare), and fees, taxes and interest (Rs 2 crores per
hectare), we are left with Rs 24.9 crores per hectare to pay for land.

What is striking is how little the transport system costs in relation to
all other infrastructure. Providing this kind of dedicated transit service
is not as extravagant as one instinctively imagines.

The figures indicate the scheme is financially viable wherever we can find
land around Mumbai under about Rs 25 crores per hectare. This sounds
eminently within reach at several suburban railway stations around the city.

*Shirish B Patel is a civil engineer and urban planner, one of three
authors who first suggested the idea of Navi Mumbai and then for five years
was in charge of the plan, design and execution of the new city.*

*Oormi Kapadia and Jasmine Saluja are both architects and urban designers,
and recipients of an awarding-winning proposal for a Community Land Trust
Model for the redevelopment of Dharavi in Mumbai.*

*This is a curtailed version of a paper that will be published in a
forthcoming issue **of **Environment and Urbanization
<https://environmentandurbanization.org/>.*