Housing development lacks momentum (includes map of residential zone – proposed development from a feasibily study)

In the last two decades Auroville Today has repeatedly reported about Aurovilles housing crisis. Today’s situation is once again grim. 201 Aurovilians and 132 Newcomers are in urgent need of housing, in addition to a steadily growing number of youth and volunteers. The Housing Service expects the numbers to increase by 50-60 people a year. But it has no means to address the need for there are no new building projects.

The only ongoing projects are Humanscapes Block 2, which will provide youth housing for 36 beds; Humanscapes Block 3, for which building permission is still awaited; Vibrance (61 beds); and the extension with a few small units of Kriya and Pony Farm. But all have their problems.

Ongoing project problems

Humanscapes is a government-sponsored project which was approved about 4 years ago after three different peer reviews. Block One – 48 beds – was opened in February 2018 when the Prime Minister of India handed the key of the first apartment to a young Aurovilian while inaugurating Auroville’s 50th anniversary. This project was later awarded the 2nd prize in residential category for 2019 by 2A Continental Architectural Award 2019 and was the 29th JK AYA winner for Green Architecture 2020. 

Block Two – 36 beds – was to be completed and occupied by October last year, but is delayed as the funds did not arrive in time. It is now scheduled for completion by June 2020 – assuming that the construction blockage due to the coronavirus will be lifted in time. Block three – 48 beds – has not yet started. “We had made the application in April 2019,” says Ole from the Housing Service. “But the application was not processed in a timely manner. The Town Development Council (TDC) was changing its application forms, which took 3 months, and the peer review took another 6 months.” The Funds and Assets Management Committee (FAMC) afterwards gave its approval on the basis of the preliminary concept and costing. “But as the Government of India grant was delayed, the making of detailed drawings and estimates had been kept pending. The completion of Block three is now estimated to happen in mid 2021,” says Suhasini, the architect. 

Vibrance too encountered funding problems. Funding from the government grant was first approved by the FAMC, then implicitly by the Governing Board of the Auroville Foundation, and construction started early 2019. But in January this year the Ministry of Human Resource Development, the nodal ministry of Auroville, objected to government grants being used for this project. The construction has since been stopped. The architects are modifying the building to become a privately-funded apartment project and the government funds will be re-routed.

Kriya and Pony Farm are temporary low-cost housing communities, as they do not fit into the Master Plan [for Kriya see AVToday # 365 of December 2019]. Their location was chosen to protect the lands from encroachment. While Kriya was funded from a grant of the Government of India, the Pony Farm houses were privately funded. Because of their temporary nature, it’s difficult to get Auroville permission to extend these projects. “The lack of clear planning prevents quick approvals,” says Sonja, another member of the Housing Board. “The Master Plan says that a road needs to be built through both communities; and because of that uncertainty, it took 15 emails to get permission to build two more temporary units in Kriya. This issue could have been avoided if the TDC had clarified how long the site could be used.” She complains of over-bureaucratisation. “The permission process is far too cumbersome. The TDC site and building permission, and the FAMC financial viability approval together take a minimum of 5 and a maximum of 13 months. This is no longer acceptable.”

Insufficient planning

“It is the task of the Town Development Council to make an urban plan on the basis of the Auroville Perspective Plan (Master Plan 2025). For this, a number of steps have to be taken. They are, firstly, to do a land suitability analysis and make a land use plan; secondly, to make Development Controls and Building Regulations; and thirdly, prepare Detailed Development Plans accordingly. All these are required before sites and building permissions can be given,” says Suhasini, who was instrumental in preparing the framework for the functioning of the TDC in 2017 [see AVToday # 335-336 of June-July 2017, “New town planning methodology approved”].

The work of preparing a land suitability analysis for the city area was given to Suhasini in May 2013 and was completed in July the next year. In November 2019, Suhasini and Prashant, as technical consultants to the Town Development Council, started preparing a land use plan for the Auroville Master Plan area, which is now almost completed. 

Suhasini explains. “The land suitability analysis proposes the best usage of each area from plot to zone based on multiple criteria. For example, a low lying area could be ideal for rainwater catchment and not for buildings or roads. The land use plan details the proposed purpose of each plot of land in the city area. Development controls (DC) and building regulations (BR) prescribe what type of development is allowed based on the proposed land use and contain details such as permitted building heights, sustainability, sanitation, safety and so on. [see box] Detailed development plans describe, locate and budget the programmes and projects that are needed for growth and development.” The DC and BR document is yet to be framed, but the identification of the development priorities that are needed to prepare detailed development plans is almost complete. 

The work of the TDC

For the development of the Residential Zone sectors I and II, the TDC now uses the draft Detailed Development Plan made in 2015 by Luis Feduchi, an urban designer living in Spain. [see AVToday # 308, March 2015]. This plan, which was neither based on any land use plan nor on any development controls and building regulations, was an attempt to interpret the Galaxy master plan for a part of the Residential Zone. Though it was widely discussed with Auroville experts and Feduchi has incorporated feedback to a large extent, community approval was never given. “It is a very technical document,” explains Tejaswini, a former member of the TDC. “We need people who can translate this document into a lay person’s language and guide it through the community approval process. But with the gradual demise of the former TDC, which started in November 2017 when most of the team resigned within the year, we never found the person to do it. The TDC now uses the document as a guide, not a bible. It is on the basis of this plan that the sites for Humanscapes and Vibrance were opened up for development.”

But what about recent permissions? “In 2019, three housing projects were submitted, two by the Housing Service and one by an Auroville architect,” says Tejaswini. “One of the Housing Service projects was approved and was given site permission, but this was later withdrawn and a new site was promised. The second project, near Vikas community, ran into objections from neighbouring communities and got stuck. They argued that the proposed location was in a green corridor, something which was apparently approved by a former TDC, but of which we have no record in the TDC. The third project, that of the architect, had a site permission, but failed to get building permission as the TDC no longer accepts that the architect is the jack-of-all-trades, doing the site layout, finding clients, being the architect for each house or apartment, managing the funds, choosing the contractor and managing / supervising the construction site. Such a comprehensive job for a sizable project has proven to be unmanageable and leads to burnouts [see for example AVToday # 338 of September 2017 about the Sanjana community]. The TDC now only accepts proposals where the responsible person or working group for each of these roles is clearly defined.”

New housing plots and NIMBYism

“Auroville Planning cannot base its development on density-number games as urban planning sometimes asks us to do,” says Tejaswini. “The TDC has recently concluded a study – an extension to Luis Feduchi’s draft Detailed Development Plan – marking plots for collective housing developments in sectors I and II of the Residential Zone [see map]. This zone houses at present 800 people or 16% of the zones projected population of 5,000 people. 4,200 more people need to be accommodated in this area if we want to achieve this projected population. The TDC will soon invite Auroville architects to submit housing projects for these plots.” 

A major project is the completion of Progress, one of the two Lines of Force in the Residential Zone and the smallest of all the Lines of Force of the Galaxy Master Plan. Progress was conceived in 1998 [see Auroville Today #113 of June 1998] but was stopped after the first section was finished. A team of project holders, an architect and a group of Aurovilians is now working to amend the project to fit the requirements. “It is meant to house roughly 700 people. But even if this project manifests with the said density, it is highly unlikely that the density of 5,000 will be reached,” says Tejaswini. “But at least we’ll have experimented with one high-density habitat, and this Line is an achievable project in today’s conditions.”

But it is increasingly difficult to start new projects. “NIMBYism [the not in my backyard attitude, eds] is very high and goes, in fact, way further than the backyard,” says Tejaswini. “This attitude hinders the manifestation of Auroville and may affect the plots now proposed by the TDC.” Tejaswini recalls that two youth hostel projects, for which the architects / project holders had been making and remaking the project brief and designs, were blocked because of NIMBYism. “That was really unfortunate. We need youth hostels. We keep talking about accommodation for young people and an increasing number of volunteers are coming to Auroville, but we do not have space for them. Moreover, the architects, who had been doing a lot of work, ran into financial problems as they were not paid. This has to change.”

How to proceed?

So far, collective housing projects have been realised either by the future inhabitants, who pooled their resources and interacted with the architect and builders, or by an enterprising architect who initiated and managed an entire project from planning to delivery, or by the Housing Service for projects financed from Government of India Grants. Now a rethink of the process is necessary.

Three things need change. To prevent blockages due to NIMBYism, the TDC will need to interact with immediate neighbours and get their approval for the development of a plot, before inviting architects to submit a project proposal. If agreement with the neighbours cannot be found, the TDC may seek community approval for the proposed development. 

A second required change is to make funding available to architects for the work of making project proposals, to prevent them from incurring losses as happened to the architects involved in making and remaking the designs for the rejected youth hostel proposals. 

Thirdly, the Housing Service should be the client of all Auroville collective housing projects. Its role should be to invite occupants and ensure the collection of funds, and be responsible for tendering the project and supervising the construction. 

Who pays for housing?

While some Newcomers to Auroville have funds to contribute to a house or apartment, many don’t. Now that funding from the Government of India for housing projects is diminishing and may completely stop, finding alternative sources of funding is becoming increasingly urgent. One way is to ask for donations from large Indian companies which like to support Auroville from their Corporate Social Responsibility budgets, or from Auroville-friendly organisations in India and abroad. Another way is to stimulate Auroville commercial units to use part of their profits or reserves to contribute to the building of staff quarters. But is this possible?

Many of Auroville’s commercial units do not invest in developing Auroville. They make their mandatory contribution of 33% of their profits to Auroville, but hold on to their 67% as they are insecure in the present economic climate and need their surplus to carry them over the lean periods. If they want to invest in housing for a fellow Aurovilian who is working in their unit, they have to make a donation from their 67%. They cannot deduct this donation from the 33%, and neither can they deduct the donation from their profit and then pay 33% from the difference. 

“Auroville’s present economic policy does not encourage investment in the development of Auroville,” says Suhasini. “We need to have a system of progressive contribution. This one-size-fits-all 33% contribution on the net surplus without distinction on size and output, type of activity and number of the jobs created, is counterproductive to the development of Auroville. For example, units that generate below 5 Lakhs net surplus should be exempt from the contribution for a specified number of years to allow them to invest in growth and expansion, including in housing the Aurovilians working in these units. Expansion and growth creates more jobs, permitting young adults to join Auroville and finance their lives here.”

Suhasini also believes that the FAMC should relax its requirement that 100% of the housing project funding has to be secured before it gives financial viability approval. “In the 35 years I’ve lived in Auroville, I’ve seen all housing projects getting fully occupied after completion. The FAMC is too risk-averse, they believe that housing units and apartment will remain unoccupied, but history shows otherwise. The demand is greater than what is on offer, and people will accept whats on offer even if it is not to their preference.”

Decisions are urgently required

The Housing Service has rung the alarm and has written to the Entry Service that there are hardly any Newcomer apartments available as these apartments are occupied by people who have nowhere to go. In particular, the situation for large families is grim. “There is a new attitude,” says Ole. “When we ask people to move out of a Newcomer apartment, as their term is over, they expect to be provided with a suitable and nice housing option, otherwise they don’t move out. We have the same problem with house-sitters [people who take care of a house during the temporary absence of the steward, eds.], and with people who live in a staff quarter but no longer work for the unit who paid for that staff quarter. We have to find solutions. Decisions on how to stimulate Auroville’s housing development are urgently required.”