The Satellite City and Why It is Needed in Bangladesh

A satellite city is basically a metropolis which conforms to a specific city modus and follows some development procedures which comply with that of a role model city or many cities in a structured manner.

We have seen that many cities have been created accordingly over the years. Some were created from scratch and some were developed from a basic minimal habitat. These include cities such as Brasilia, Islamabad and many others.

Many a times these cities are needed to actually diversify the overall population, to take the load off a major city, and segregate them in a distributed manner. We have seen that this helps to mitigate many urban problems and overcome challenges especially with regard to
constraints that exist in them.

The challenges in major metropolitan cities are mostly relevant to accommodation, utility, traffic handling, service industry constraints, as well availability of employment, and basic necessities. There are many other aspects that are not being mentioned here. It must be taken
into consideration that ratio of availability to actual need is drastically imbalanced.

These include teachers, employment, transportation, housing, and other urban facilities for the residents in a specific city. We must also take into consideration the influx of inward bound regular population negatively contributing to an increase and making it harder for the city to actually manage. A city will be welcoming in approach however they are mostly not able to cater positively to the demands of the person coming most of the time.

Steps have been taken by major metropolises such as Dhaka by extending the boundaries north, south, east, and west, enlarging its parameters, making it a larger city in size. However, this measure is only redefining other townships and villages as part of greater Dhaka under the label and authority of Dhaka City Corporation.

It is not an appropriate mechanism to mitigate problems, as many challenges still remain, as manageability is harder, as variabilities extend beyond control. Manageability includes a larger domain of control which touches upon authority, utilities availability and handing, capacity handling, safety management as well as other aspects such as communications. Each aspect is itself very challenging in the larger domain. This is why Dhaka itself has been placed under two segments namely North and South considering it already has a 20 million-plus population to tackle.

It is not as if the satellite city models have not been contemplated. Many suburbs have been built around a satellite city layout in a small scale such as Bashundhara, Uttara, Satarkul, Purbachal etc. However, these have been within the confines of a major city. This is helping to an extent in the short term but when one contemplates the accrued challenges it does backfire when capacity is utilized to the full extend. These suburbs also do not encourage the other cities to be prioritized as a possibility.

What should be done is for planners to actually create other cities layouts replicating a role model city. That way the resources can be distributed and load can be balanced and at the same time one can show the development of other cities. Even manageability is easier because it is distributed thereafter on the basis of a common mechanism.

These are means whereby which a social balance is also created. The elites are not concentrated in only one city. They will be able to relocate elsewhere comfortably provided that employment, social activities, schooling, housing and shopping facilities, socio-platforms
and entertainment is made available concurrently.

Generally, there is a political, developmental, business related, professional, academic, as well as religious, and security touch, mainly when a society or a neighborhoods is created. The same is applicable for a satellite city. Of course there are other aspects that are there. We can actually go into micro aspects too.

In India, for example, Indian Institutes of Technology (IIT) based centres were set up and developed in many cities around one set of services, to cater to the insitutions. The IITs focused on information technology, engineering, and other relevant sciences, and its dependencies. A few include Hyderabad, Kanpur, Patna, and 20 others. This enabled a focus point for regional development in other cities.

It may also be mentioned that just setting up the IITs was not sufficient. As stated above a community-based site preparation had to be done to make it worthy of functionality and scope for organic growth was made possible accordingly with appropriate habitable environment for employees as well as their families.

The same is applicable in Bangladesh. We have seen the need to decentralize the operations of Dhaka City and allot it on the basis of aerial strength and core competency of the resources, specifically employment. It is a way of cutting costs, as well as diversify focus nationally, onto other cities/townships. Not only does this give a more complete picture, it basically helps to rectify the imbalance that is prevalent, as a large portion of job seekers, are focusing only on Dhaka and this itself is creating the imbalance.

This drive cannot be undertaken by the private sector only. It requires a joint cooperation with the national government where the latter has to play an instrumental role both financially and with strategic planning and encouragement. Encouragement is needed in many ways.

Primarily there is also a form of resistance to change. It is a mighty challenge to handle as it is very very difficult to break. Therefore, many forms of subsidies and benefits must be given too to all concerned to undertake this initiative. This may require mechanisms for rewarding for relocation, financial and non-financial benefits for employment creation, creation of services and industries in a relocated area, as well as other forms development.

In other development, there may be requirement of social service whereby which awareness vide workshops can mentally orient those staying in the cities/townships to adjust to the possibility of what changes may happen with the development of the satellite city. This will assure a form of partial readiness besides the physical setting up of the respective city. Patience is also required as everything will automatically not fall in place. Many hindrances require overcoming and there will be occasional stumbling blocks which may not be pre-evaluated and thus may require to be rectified.

The most important aspect of it is the plan itself. It must be planned on the basis of a long-term forward conceptual vision of what is likely to happen when scaling up and the growth, over at least 25-30 years ahead minimum. A projected simulation, is a must with all variables, as stipulated earlier, being taken into consideration.

The positivity of an existing metropolis must be brought into the new framework omitting the drawbacks that are prevailing. This helps
to finetune the new metropolis into become picture perfect. Obviously, it one can never be absolutely perfect. There are going to be shortfalls and negativities that will be there. Natural aspects help especially when tourism is considered or if site seeing is a priority of the visit. Therefore, in Bangladesh recreating a city is sufficient rather than putting emphasis only on over automation. We must admire the beauty of the country and its cities and townships as well while the plan is laid.

Another thing that must be optimized is the utilization of aerial space. Considering a city having limited square kilometers, the only way to optimize is to actually build vertically as much as possible, using up the horizontal space in full. That way places such as Singapore within 735 square kilometers utilized its landed areas by building as many skyscrapers as possible to accommodate their population. Skyscrapers mean skyscrapers with a minimum of 20 floors.

However, in a small city, too many cannot be accommodated. It is not as if the buildings need to be state of the art towers. They need to be standard societal structures which can cater to a large population with ease and optimize the available space accordingly. Therefore, whatever can be done should be done. Accordingly, plannings must be made for the same taking all aspects into consideration.

From the side of the private sector one must obviously invest as well as promote certain initiatives and services and bring available resources into the project along with the same approach as the government. It also means emphasis on promotional work as well as means by which one develops focus areas such as education, employment opportunities, available services, construction works, health care. markets and manpower which may include develop them as well, etc. These are the basic foundations on which a city is efficiently functional.

These roadmaps of development will be contributory to a balance of manpower allotment nationwide and they will help to overcome the excess population growth in the capital and other major cities (if any). As a social and development purpose, nationally everyone should be involved to push forward this initiative. The fruits of the effort will be viewable thereafter.