A new way forward?

“This is the third attempt in the last decade to chart a way forward for Auroville,” explained Andreas von Sadow, one of the visiting experts, who chaired the process. The first attempt in 2010 culminated in the Integral Sustainability Platform (ISP) concept. The second was the 2015 Retreat which was designed to come up with a road map for the ensuing three years. While both the ISP and the Retreat threw up many interesting ideas, most of them have not manifested on the rocky ground of Auroville.

This time it was decided to try another way. It was to be a hands-on planning charrette with input from visiting experts. The main focus was upon town planning but it was understood that as this is an integral process it would also include issues like governance, youth empowerment and bioregional relations.

Problems, dreams, actions

On the first morning participants made lists of problems, dreams and desired actions in relation to Auroville’s development. The problems were all too familiar: plans get made but are not implemented, not enough skilled people for the work, lack of accountability of working groups, a few people blocking development, lack of consensus about the overall vision etc.

The dreams included a unified society with everybody working to achieve collective well-being; new thinking free from prejudice and old patterns; a society that is honest and collaborative, open hearted, open minded and joyful; a welcoming vibrant city where education is a priority and which is in harmony with nature; a true innovator of innovative and sustainable living; and a place that shares resources responsibly with the bioregion.

When it came to desired actions, some broad suggestions were made – like don’t keep going back to what Mother said but decide for ourselves what is best, build friendship with the plan we have been given, create platforms to share and discuss openly – then the participants split into groups to focus upon different themes. The governance group suggested a new selection process in which group members would select new members; the village relations group said we need to find a better way for local people and Aurovilians to exchange skills and ideas; while the youth group pointed out they felt excluded from decision-making so much more needs to be done to encourage their potential.

By day three the experts had a better understanding of the main challenges. They summarised these later as declining unity among Aurovilians; disagreement over the need for a city of 50,000 and over a fixed or evolving Galaxy plan; pressure of development from the bioregion; the need for a new economic model; youth issues; shortage of skills; the need for a sustainable transport system; and lack of community participation in planning.

However, they were still unclear what the Aurovilians wanted from them, so they organized a fish-bowl session with the participants to draw this out. The experts concluded from this that the Aurovilians wanted them to concentrate on practical issues, particularly small-scale examples of a possible way forward, to help them develop the idea of Auroville as a ‘garden city’, and to find a ‘third way’ beyond the planning antagonisms of the past.

What the experts felt they could offer to the Aurovilians was their experience with participatory planning processes, and with using water in innovative ways and as a design principle. They would also introduce the toolkit of holistic town planning.

They made inspiring presentations on these topics, drawn from their own experience of working around the world (see accompanying article), and then the participants broke up into five focus groups to work upon actionable ways forward. Their suggestions were presented to the community on the last afternoon.

Representation and reaching out

Andreas, on behalf of the ‘good governance’ group, noted how difficult the job of the Town Development Council (TDC) is. The TDC has to consult numerous groups on any new proposal. Moreover, it has to deal with four major forces that influence development in Auroville: its spiritual ideals, the Working Groups, the Residents Assembly and non-local forces (like Indian planning laws and regulations). Another reason why so little gets implemented in the present set-up is that a few people in the Residents Assembly or Working Groups can block proposals favoured by the majority.

Andreas suggested one way out would be to create an elected parliament, a chamber of representatives, because then the TDC would have a body to negotiate with if they run into trouble.

The ‘widening participation’ group felt that another way forward was engaging more people in the planning process, including volunteers, Newcomers, villagers from the bioregion and, above all, youth. Participation should be fun so planning events could be held in different venues, like the Youth Centre, using movies and computer games which help people do hands-on planning.

To stimulate and empower the youth, a youth forum could be set up to tackle youth issues. To prepare youth for serving in major working groups, a support group of older Aurovilians could be created, citizenship could be taught in schools and working groups could welcome young people, first as observers and later as full participants. This group plans an ‘unfestival’ in the near future to ‘plant the seed’.

A third group worked on a pilot project entitled “fusion not confusion”. They were concerned by land encroachment from village development but they also recognised that the villagers suffer because of tourism generated by Aurovile. This group’s proposal was to develop a plot between Center Field and Edayanchavady village as a shared space in which villagers and Aurovilians could meet, exchange ideas and develop projects. This new ‘frontage’ to the village could be a mixed-use space incorporating, among other things, village businesses and new technologies to manage water and waste in the village. A new road could wind through this shared space which could replace the road which at present takes day tourists through Edayanachavady village en route to the Visitors Center.

“It is a transition concept,” explained one of the team members, “that could also be applied in other areas where Auroville and the villages meet as a way of dealing with the interface of the two communities.”

Water ideas

The water team looked at four different aspects of water management. Regarding the larger bioregion, they recommended that shrimp farms be closed around Kaliveli Tank and the indigenous vegetation reintroduced; eco-agriculture be encouraged to the south of the Tank and afforestation on the sandstone Auroville plateau; artificial barriers and recharge be used to harvest rainwater; and that treated water from the Pondicherry sewage farm be channelled to neighbouring tanks in Alankuppam and Irumbai to help re-establish the water balance in these areas.

Professor Herbert Dreitseitl, a water specialist, shared some “very preliminary” ideas about how the beauty, spirituality and functionality of water could be integrated in the centre of Auroville. He sketched a water channel around the Matrimandir, on one side of which could be something like a temple tank, and on the other natural forest and gardens. “The gardens could be both aesthetic and a means of treating and filtering water.” Bridges would cross the water channel to the Matrimandir. “Crossing a bridge would be like taking a journey from the outer to the inner world and water is a perfect symbol of this transition.”

Finally, the water group felt there was a need for a professional awareness programme for Auroville architects and contractors that would focus upon water. Blue-green integration (a balanced ecosystem of water and vegetation) should become an integral part of the site application process and design awards could be given to people who come up with the most water-conscious designs.

They felt it is necessary to develop a common understanding in the wider community of water management, and this could be done through videos, brochures and water festivals.

The final work group was basically a town planning group which addressed the three pillars of holistic town planning: spiritual influences, environmental sustainability and the human issues of social and economic sustainability. Their work was presented by Joachim Elbe, a specialist in eco-design, and reflected the approach he had outlined in his earlier presentation to the participants.

He advised that the first step in making a master plan was to connect with the ‘soul’ of the site through various means, including geomancy and meditation, because each site is full of different spiritual and elementary energies. “This is the most important aspect. Once you have done this you can use earth healing ceremonies if there are places which have to be cleaned up from the past.”

The next stage is a physical reading of the site in order to understand water flows etc. and to implement a bioclimatic response and a circular blue-green infrastructure. The human ‘pillar’ would involve, on the urban scale, designing a settlement to foster health and community.

Based upon these guiding principles, the group had come up with a new take upon the galaxy concept which is “a field of force organized like a galaxy”. “It’s not a plan, just an idea about what a new process could look like, and it’s full of mistakes,” clarified Joachim. They wondered if there could be a “galaxy of water” by linking up and redirecting some of the existing watercourses in the city. Future activities in the different Zones could be integrated according to this. For example, in the International Zone this “water master plan” could be used to demarcate the continents.

The group also suggested that Bharatipuram village could be surrounded by a buffer zone because it is an exchange space. It could be opened up for different activities, like new forms of agriculture, workshops to make it into a breathing space between the village and Auroville.

The group spent most of its time on the environmental aspect of the Residential Zone. As this Zone is the most exposed to the prevailing winds, they considered how this Zone could look if its design related to the existing Galaxy form yet prioritised natural cooling and water management by using eco-city tools and strategies. For example, the Lines of Force could be replaced by blue-green infrastructure – an aquaforest combining trees, gardens and water. Communities and community spaces would then be embedded in this infrastructure. One of the group characterised this concept, half-jokingly, as “kissing the Galaxy alive”.

What next?

The focus groups that emerged from the workshop say they will continue their work as long as they have energy, and their findings and suggestions will inform city and bioregional planning.

Certainly there was no shortage of enthusiasm and ideas – some readily actionable, others far more ‘visionary’ – during the six day charrette. However, the experience of the previous two way forward initiatives in Auroville is that it is one thing to come up with ideas and objectives during a high power workshop but quite another to implement them in the cold light of day.

However, it may be wrong to expect a one-to-one correspondence between plans and action in a place as non-linear and complex as Auroville. And these workshops may be more about re-stimulating the undoubted innovativeness and idealism of Aurovilians as the first step towards new, unexpected and adventurous initiatives in the sphere of town planning and elsewhere.

It would not be before time...

Aftermath

Ten days after the workshop, a number of senior Aurovilians addressed a letter to the community in which they expressed strong reservations about the workshop. While they conceded there were many inspiring elements, they were disturbed by the process and the emphasis upon sustainable approaches to town planning because “Auroville’s higher aim and plan as a city for human unity also takes into account the present evolutionary crisis which cannot be resolved by sustainable paradigms alone”.

In their view, the final presentation offered not a merging of eco and urban elements but “a green suburban settlement for roughly 5,000 – 10,000” in which the main elements of the Galaxy were excluded or distorted: the Lines of Force and Crown abolished, the Zones radically modified and the Matrimandir Lake mainly a channel.

They concluded, “Eco cities are being built in several places. We are here to manifest Auroville in its totality. Towards this, we want to work together in collaboration and openness.”

The fact that more than 50 years after Roger first presented the Galaxy plan we still can’t agree on how to manifest it suggests that there are deep fault lines in the community over development, which urgently need to be healed.

Clearly, if it has done nothing else, the recent workshop has opened up the town planning debate in Auroville to a wider audience. And the way forward, everybody seems to agree, lies in genuine collaboration.

But the question remains, on what basis?