Anupam Saraph Posted online: Tuesday, July 25, 2006 at 1446 hours IST Updated: Tuesday, July 25, 2006 at 1454 hours IST
July 25: After an onslaught of disasters Mumbai is waking up to its design failure. Or is it? Is it still busy arguing what is wrong and who is to blame? Did it need such a tragedy to make us sit up to the need for redesigning our systems? Or have we not recognized that need as yet?
Disasters are unacceptable, often unexpected, performance of systems. They happen because the design did not build in a mechanism to buffer or prevent them. Naturally when people, communities, lifestyles, economics and cultures change designs need to change. If we put no effort into design, the city systems simply design themselves over time- then the design specs may not be the ones we desire.
Did the designers of our current urban transport systems worry about security as a design parameter? It is a need of the current world we live in. Whether it is biometric smart-cards for commuters to access regular compartments or even railway platforms, or luggage check-in systems, or mobile jammers on public train networks- even public places- will depend on the design specifications of the new system.
What designs are required to provide mobility to over 19 million residents of Mumbai and an almost an equal number of people pass through it every day- people who come for work, people who travel through Mumbai and tourists?
Where should the traffic attractors be? Can we segregate school traffic? Can we have a college transport network to move the college youth on private transport? Should everything be connected to the same transportation lines? Should we design our road and rail networks to compete or complement? Can there be feeder networks of alternate modes to main arteries? What is the average distance each Mumbaikar must travel every day? Or the time they must spend in travelling? Should the new design parameters make this time be productive or entertaining?
Can we stagger timings of offices in different parts of Mumbai to regulate road traffic? Can we provide a means to track a vehicle- or a passenger- in case of emergency? How can we build a means to stop, slow, redirect traffic?
Can our designs help spot out school traffic and provide safety? Or our ambulances, fire engines and police vans to run unobstructed or be within 5 minutes of any point of need?
Can our police be given the controls to regulate mobility? Can they be giving the means to decrease the time it would take them to change the speed at which the city moves? Or for that matter the access that the city provides? What is the response time for the traffic to respond to police regulation and redirection? In case of a disaster is that less than the respite we have?
On 7/11, 2 minutes is all the respite we had between the first blast and next. Can our systems respond in this time? Stop all the trains and evacuate passengers in this time interval? Or ensure that medical, fire and security personnel will know the exact positions and be there in 2 minutes from the alert?
These are design questions, not analysis. We decide the limits, constraints and performance parameters of our systems by the way we design them, not by how we debate about their failure. If we build a system capable of transporting a tenth of a million of people per trip, can we expect it to perform at twice, thrice or ten times the volume? How do we redesign systems that have crossed original design parameters or where the design specifications have become obsolete?
What design will contain our urban waste from littering the city till it is removed? How much respite do we have before it needs to be collected? Or for that matter sewage?
What designs allow us to deliver clean potable water, or for that matter food? Or gas, electricity, petrol, diesel? Do we have the respite to wait while our system still attempts to respond to our needs?
Do our designs increase the respite time we have available in case of disaster, or do they decrease it? With modern design of high density communities and with governance fragmented into departments that do not have a mission or do no work together for a common mission, can respite be increased?
Do the designs of our governance mechanisms increase the speed of our response to changes in the condition of our urban processes?
Managing Mumbai, or any modern community for that matter, will have to focus on redesigning the urban processes for mobility, water, food, energy delivery, waste removal, and information sharing and processing. It will have to focus on redesigning governance to give decision making back to the lowest level where it can happen. The design will have to be similar to the autonomous nervous system we have: one that allows us to react to dangers without needing the brain to signal us every time.
The design will have to combine different legacy departments into missions; bring a focus of what the department is meant to do and ensure that it is able to do it. The design will have to work around every fragmentation caused by politics, law or religion. Politics, law and religion can enable designs, not make them. They can choose between designs not create them.
Patchwork redesign is often more dangerous than no design; it simply shifts the problem and sometimes magnifies disaster when it happens. Redesign requires a complete recognition of the output we desire and designing mechanisms to create that output.
How do we redesign? Ask design questions when you encounter a problem. Design is not about blame. It is about making the system work. Ask if the system can deliver what you would like it to. If it cannot, accept that and state it loud and clear. Then ask what design can make the system perform. Ask what we can do to make the system have the desired performance. Seek out design specialists to help redesign systems. Ensure that redesigned systems can be checked to perform within acceptable standards.
Most importantly create pressure groups to push for redesign, to state the new design criteria. Build a positive city, design a constructive world.
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July 25: After an onslaught of disasters Mumbai is waking up to its design failure. Or is it? Is it still busy arguing what is wrong and who is to blame? Did it need such a tragedy to make us sit up to the need for redesigning our systems? Or have we not recognized that need as yet?
