Lahore urban planning is a tragic loop, farmland that fills, displacing the poor and destroying the environment, all for real estate without soul. The Ravi Riverfront project is its latest more reckless bet.
It is no secret that Lahore has inherited a colonial legacy of random urban planning. However, instead of the correction of the course, it seems to have doubled the worst aspects of it. The last monstrosity in this current saga of urban expansion obsessed with the car is the Ravi Riverfront urban development project.
Presented as a plan to “revive” the Ravi, this concrete fever dream of 100,000 acres will allegedly convert the dying river into a perennial body of fresh water. Actually, it is an ecological nightmare wrapped as a great vision. The plan involves massive urban development on both sides of the riverbank, an initiative that will displace farmers, destroy agricultural land and increase flood risks, all to create another real estate empire.
The past is a prologue: Lahore’s colonial plan for disaster
The environmental crises (floods, toxic air, water shortage and expansion without control) can be sent to the British colonial government. The British, focused on controlling the space and maximizing profits, introduced a chaotic clique from urban planning authorities and inequitable housing policies. They prioritized the development of the tape, the suburban expansion and the class -based segregation.
The Lahore improvement Trust, established in 1936, and later the Development Authority of Lahore, formed in 1975, carried out this legacy, favoring the projects that attended to the elite while letting the working class defend himself in informal settlements.
After independence, Lahore’s planning philosophy remained unchanged: building, building large and building for the rich. The master plans were written and ignored. The agricultural lands were meals by constantly expanding housing societies. Instead of densifying the city and investing in public transport, decision makers encouraged the dependence of the car and the expansion of the road, a strategy that has not only exacerbated pollution, but also created an urban form that is hostile for pedestrians and residents of the working class.
Take Gulberg, for example. Once designed as a leafy residential and low density area, it has become an overheated concrete jungle, courtesy of unregulated commercial expansion. The same destination before the extensions of the model city and the Samnabad once green. Even the oldest schemes such as Shadbagh, developed after the partition, reveal a pattern: initially undesirable, then developed with basic infrastructure, then surpassed by the buyers of the upper and middle class, then drowned by congestion and pollution.
Lahore’s planning history is a tragic loop.
RUDA – A flood plain disguised as housing scheme
Ravi is already a dying river, thanks to decades of pollution, invasions and poor management. But instead of adopting a first conservation approach, the solution of the Ravi Urban Development Authority (RUDA) is to build high luxury highs, closed communities and shopping centers in its flood plains.
Let that sink – flood plains.
The same land aimed at absorbing excess water during the monsoon season is delivered to private developers. If the story has taught us something, it is that when it is based on flood plains, the water does not disappear. Simply find a new place to flood, generally the houses of those who cannot afford to live in the exclusive enclaves of Rue.
Environmentalists have rightly pointed out that altering the flow of Ravi could have disastrous consequences. Changing its course could lead to more frequent and serious floods, as seen in the past when the embankments could not contain the waves of the river monsoon.
And then there is the problem of the earth. More than 80 percent of the area designated for Ruda is currently used for agriculture, providing food and livelihoods for thousands. But since when has farmers care about Lahore? Using the Land Acquisition Law of the colonial era of 1894, a favorite tool of governments seeking to take land with “public purpose”, the Punjab government is forcing people to abandon their lands. A Wuman Right Watch report even documented instances of farmers who face intimidation, legal harassment and absolute coercion.
In January 2022, the Superior Court of Lahore (LHC) declared the unconstitutional project. Subsequently, the Supreme Court (SC)]revoked the ruling, while ordering the authorities to ensure that the earth is acquired “with consent.” We all know what that means in practice.
The irony is painful. A project launched as a “Renaissance” plan of the river is destroying the ecosystem that maintains life throughout the Ravi. A project that claims to solve Lahore’s urban problems is to do exactly what created them first: privileged real estate magnates and the few rich at the expense of common people.
Breaking the cycle
Lahore’s planning trajectory needs immediate and radical change. The answer is not found in more closed communities and roads, but a serious commitment to sustainable urbanism. This means investing in public transport instead of more roads. This means densifying the existing city instead of expanding out. This means protecting agricultural land instead of razing it for housing schemes.
We need to recognize that Lahore is not just a recreation patio for developers. It is a living city and breathed with a rich history and a future that deteriorates rapidly. The Ravi River does not need luxury apartments on its banks. You need a first conservation strategy, one that prioritizes the restoration of your natural flow, control industrial pollution and reintroduce native vegetation.
But such a strategy does not earn money for the right people, right? Unless we challenge this ecologically destructive urban planning model, we will remain trapped in an endless cycle of environmental collapse and social inequality.
It is time to break the cycle before nothing is left to save.
Image of heading: Chahaha Bagh, a luxury housing development project in construction in the new city along the Ravi River. – RUDA website/Archive
