HIGH RISE : OFFICES or RESIDENCES? Charles Correa Architect and Planner Charles Correa Associates Mumbai, India
HIGH RISE: OFFICES or RESIDENCES?
The issue is not just how high a building can go, but really of what goes into the building. Office buildings create 2 kinds of problems: Parking: Alleviated by ygood public transport e.g. (Nobody in Manhattan need own a car) Rush hour traffic: Mitigated by Staggering office hours But Apartment buildings are another thing. Families need schools, hospitals, play fields. Let s look at the numbers:
AMENITIES PER PERSON -Schools and Hospitals : 6 m 2 -Green areas: 4 acres per 1000 population i.e. 16 m 2 TOTAL - 22 m 2 Of which, at least 10 m²/person/ should be within easy reach
To this must be added, the built-up space within the apartment For an apartment of50m i 2 accommodating a middle-income family of 5 persons, the built-up space will come up to 10m 2 Building Footprint 10m 2 / person
Avg. Area per Pe erson 50 40 10 5 0 + 10m 2 / person 10.5 15 12 11 10m 2 110 210 60 30 m 2 m 2 100 0 50 m 2 = Amenities Total Building Footprint Total Area / person 15 Point of diminishing returns Total area/person curve flattens out after 10.25 12 11 10.5 10.25 1 2 5 10 No. of Floors 40
+ 10m 2 / person 10m 2 m 2 Building Footprint Amenities Total Area / person = 0 m 2 210 m 2 10.5 Note that the amount of area required for amenities is directly proportional to the number of persons living there and is not just the fixed 15% specified in DC rules. rules.
+ 10m 2 / person 10m 2 m 2 Building Footprint Amenities Total Area / person = 0 m 2 210 m 2 10.5 UNLESS this area required for amenities is actually available, to grant additional FSI in order to house the poor is to condemn them to a life of deprivation.
Avg. Area per Pe erson Those calculations were for a Middle Income unit of 50m². For a EWS Unit of 25m 2, the situation is even more critical A family of 5 persons, will have a built-up up space of 5 m² each: 50 40 10 5 0 15 12 11 10.5 1 2 5 10 Total area/person No. of Floors 10.25 40
Avg. Area per Pe erson These calculations were for a Middle Income unit of 50m². For a EWS Unit of 25m 2, the situation is even more critical A family of 5 persons, will have a built-up up space of 5 m² each: 50 40 10 5 0 Point of diminishing returns Total area/person curve flattens out after 10.1 15 12.5 11 10.5 10.2 10.1 1 2 5 10 No. of Floors 40
Avg. Area per Pe erson For a Luxury apartment of 0m 2 accommodating a family of 5 persons, the built-up up space will come upto 50 40 10 5 0 40m 2 / person Total area/person 15 12.5 11 10.5 10.2 10.1 1 2 5 10 No. of Floors 40
Avg. Area per Pe erson 50 40 10 5 0 40m 2 / person 50 Total area/person Point of diminishing returns 30 curve flattens out after 11 18 14 12 15 11 12.5 11 10.5 10.2 10.1 1 2 5 10 No. of Floors 40
So the key issue of high-rise housing is NOT how to construct taller buildings - but the question of determining what urban amenities per capita (schools, hospitals, play fields) should be provided. These are issues which must be addressed by Education experts and Health experts - not by Architects and Engineers. To recall our initial calculation
Here is an example of what is happening:. 3 new buildings are added Amenities required for these buildings Instead, this land is used to build even more buildings!
CHICAGO HOUSTON NEW TORONTO SYDNEY BOSTON YORK Because of the crucial importance of amenities in residential areas, high rise buildings in most cities around the world are used essentially for offices while families continue to live in low-rise & medium-rise housing which has access to open spaces and other essential amenities. Most of the families living i in Manhattan are either very rich whites or very poor In blacks. downtown The rest have Boston, fled the suburbs-for the high the schools, rise sport facilities, etc there. What is left behind is: Alienation and Crime. buildings are mainly offices So also, in Toronto This is what is happening in cities like Nairobi, Johannesburg, Sao Paolo. and not residential. Do we want Mumbai to go this way?
DENSITY MAPS OF VARIOUS CITIES AROUND THE WORLD 17,0 21,700 48,300 53,000 LONDON BERLIN MEXICO NEW YORK CITY 75,169 BANGALORE 78,355 96,460 101,066 KOLKATA DELHI MUMBAI
The highest densities are in Mumbai not because of tall buildings, but because of very small area per capita...
... and high occupancy per room!
High density is not just a question of the height of the building but the area of its footprint as a percentage of the site. In Mumbai, the areas with the tallest buildings are not necessarily the areas with the highest densities as the following site plans demonstrate.
COMPARITIVE STUDY OF GLOBAL F.S.I AND PLOT F.S.I BALLARD ESTATE GLOBAL F.S.I 18 1.8 GLOBAL F.S.I. 2.2 GLOBAL F.S.I.(2/1) 2.2 MARINE DRIVE NARIMAN POINT
PARIS European cities like London, Rome, Amsterdam are alive because their centres still have these facilities - so everyone wants to LIVE there. In Paris you can sense the organic relationship eato - between ee people, e, sidewalks, s, trees, parks.
To sum up : We want development. We want more intense and intensive i use of fland. But this is not just a simplistic problem of building higher h and higher. h Cities and their buildings are an intricate mix of conflicting entities. To build sustainable cities, we must understand these entities And optimize ALL the various parameters not just ONE.
In this process, it is essential that we differentiate between Offices and Residential developments. Thank You.