Urban environment a concern in the coming years

Kolkata, Jun 5 (UNI) Urban planners today noted with concern that in another 20 years' time, an additional 3 billion people would require extensive town planning, leading to a crisis.

A concerted effort towards redistribution of population is necessary for which small townships need to be developed, Center for Human Settlements president K P Bhattacharjee said at a seminar organised by the American Centre to commemorate the Workld Environment Day.

Urban planners should take note of the change in population demography like age, gender and educational status of families before planning for development of small cities urban centres, former Vice-chancellor of Kalyani University Sitangsu Mookherjee said.

Senior architect of Military Engineering Service S K Ghosh said in places where there is a resource crunch the model of public private participation should be considered.

Architect and planner Dr Animesh Haldar said conservation of bio-diversity should be taken up along with urban planning for synergistic development.

He said proper disaster management planning should also be taken up to take care of the earthquakes and floods, which may cause immense human misery.

UNI XC TJP PA HT2005