| Summary: | Chennai’s urban history has evolved and flourished around an elaborate cascading system of water tanks, locally known as ‘Erys’. Traditionally, as an agrarian society these erys were ecological commons that engendered biodiversity, and community building. They served as essential water reservoirs and flood control systems that were collectively managed by the communities.
Over the last two decades, Chennai’s built-up area increased by 71% by indiscriminately expanding over these erys, transforming a largely wet and permeable land into impervious concrete. As a result, this has not only degraded the natural ecology of the city but also increased the flooding risks of the communities that currently live around water bodies. With the proposed eight fold urban expansion of Chennai’s territory by 2026 and lack of guidelines to conserve and manage the water bodies, the survival of these erys and livelihood around them are highly challenged.
In contrast to the current development model that disregards erys, the thesis re-imagines -Erys as a way of organizing urbanism. The thesis proposes a spatial framework that prioritizes both the ecology and community to address the complex challenges of urbanization, floods and droughts. To fully understand the potential of erys in the current urban conditions, the project navigates between three scales 1) Watershed, 2) Sub-Watershed and 3) Neighborhood scale. The proposed interventions seek to create a water-inclusive urban growth for Chennai, that protects preserves the indigenous water systems and engages the communities that live around them.
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