RUDA

 

RAVI URBAN DEVELOPMENT AUTHORITY

The Ravi Riverfront Urban Development Project (RRUDP) is an urban development megaproject in Lahore District, Punjab, Pakistan that runs along the Ravi River in a northeast-to-southwest direction. It includes the construction of a 41,308-hectare (102,074-acre) planned city and the rehabilitation of the Ravi River into a perennial freshwater body. The project is to be completed in three phases. It is expected to be the largest riverfront in the world when finished

Ravi Urban Development Authority (RUDA) intends to develop urban areas of the province into sustainable, livable, and well-managed engines of economic growth. Urban development and its management are critically linked with sound, comprehensive, and strategic metropolitan-level long-term planning. Over the years, rapid urbanization has changed the socio-economic and physical characteristics of the cities. The physical growth of the cities has emerged in a very different way from the land uses proposed in master plans and other such documents.

Lahore, the capital of the Punjab province, is rapidly urbanizing being a regional urban center of key commercial, financial, industrial, and socio-cultural significance. Given the city’s projected expansion and issues related to water in the Ravi River, the Government of Punjab has planned the Ravi Riverfront Urban Development on both banks of the river alongside a 46 km long stretch that is contiguous to Lahore district’s northern and western boundaries through its authority Ravi Urban Development Authority.

The structure of the city will stimulate urban renewal with penetrable green belts along the fields as the main spine of the city is called the Ecological Corridor. Plains will feature eco-ponds, wetlands, wildlife sanctuaries, theme parks, botanical gardens, and algae ponds while promoting pedestrian commercial green boulevards and major roads. Greenbelt helps direct development where there are services like hospitals, schools, and roads to better use our expensive infrastructure. Ecological Corridor will connect the waterfront promenade experience with the green belt experience which will revive the Ravi River. It will be a door between creative approaches of metropolitan areas, Lahore, and the world, a seamless melting pot of both global communities and local societies. With the vision to make Lahore a world leader in innovation, technology, and a hub of creativity it will be the connecting point for millions of people in a year, thus providing a dynamic process of innovation, imitation, and improvement. The creation of space will remain varied in scale, yet the focus will be the intimate space through various layers ensuring our economy will continue to thrive and is open to business. In essence, an economic structure based on ideas and innovation sets the country in an upward creative motion. The RRUDP innovation city will provide a unique and unprecedented environment in which technology and media businesses can flourish to benefit local and global markets. The aim is to have IT, media, and local and international sectors under one shelter to promote industrial technology and businesses while attracting technology-based industries to the region and providing job opportunities with world-class facilities. The urban city strives to improve the economic climate of Lahore through the provision of financing, technical assistance, training, business tax incentives, and workforce programs with countless opportunities for local-international investors and business communities. It is committed to increasing cultural participation and assisting businesses to innovate, adapt and grow with market demands as well as deliver high-quality goods and services to under-served communities.

DRAWBACKS:

Ruda has promised a lot of things but it comes with a cost. The land that ruda is supposed to use has been illegally possessed without the consent of its landowners. The land was previously used for seasonal crop cultivation and was a source of living for many of the farmers that have now been bulldozed for the city. Many farmers have been dislocated without any alternative accommodation. Another problem in its construction is that ruda is being built on a riverbed, which means that ruda has a potential threat of urban flooding during monsoon seasons. It will also pollute the river more as the city’s waste and sewage water will be allowed to be disposed of there. The Ravi Riverfront Project is many things. At its best, it is a vain, bloated, misguided attempt that many environmentalists and hydrological experts have called an impending ecological and social disaster. At its worst, it is an uncaring attempt to turn the Ravi and its embankments into a playground for real estate developers that intend to treat it as a cash-cow for at least the next two decades. This project also goes against the UN-assigned SDGs (sustainable development goals). This project is not a development for all as only the elite class will be able to afford it and the common man whose living conditions are worse wouldn’t be able to afford it.

It is nothing but another disaster as it is going to worsen the effects of climate change on our country, it will add more to the already existing pollution and other environmental issues.

Conclusion 

The problem with the Ravi project is that it has largely remained unplanned and has seemed more interested in creating real estate development opportunities rather than building a city. It would be mawkish even to say that RUDA has tried its best to promote and make work a largely flawed concept. In straighter words, it is a real estate development project in the garb of an environmental and urban necessity that will end up harming not just people, communities, and farmland but an essential river in the long run. The rest, as they say, are all details.