Humanising Hinjewadi: Capturing the pulse of residents and its ‘smart’ neighbourhood
The project aims to study if the working and living environment at Hinjewadi is culturally and socially rich and humane.
Over the weekend, a group of architecture students from the Padmbhushan Dr Vasantdada Patil College Of Architecture were busy arranging exhibitions, meeting people and taking surveys in Hinjewadi as part of their final year project called Humanising Hinjewadi. The project aims to study if the working and living environment at Hinjewadi is culturally and socially rich and humane.
“The workshop was based on a public participatory module where the students could interact with the stakeholders working or living in the study areas between Shivaji chowk and Wipro chowk in Hinjewadi. This interaction gave the students an overview of the development – issues, concerns and potentials in Hinjewadi,” said Garima Buragohain, architect and urban planner and faculty, Studio Coordinator.
The study was initiated by professor Prasanna Desai, architect and director of VIT’s PVP College of Architecture and fourth year design faculty team of architects Hrishikesh Ashtekar, Garima Buragohain, Aarthi Chandrashekhar and Devendra Deshpande under the guidance of architects Nachiket Patwardhan, Shirish Kembhavi, Alok Kothari, Abhijit Kondhalkar and Amit Patel.
“Humanising Hinjewadi’ not only helped us acknowledge the diverse aspects of urban designing, but also gave us a mammoth opportunity to have one to one interaction with the end users. After all, our ideas can only be determined rational when we succeed in achieving ‘end user’s comfort’ as our final goal,”said Dhruv Phadke, a student.
While residents also interacted with the students and explained the problems they faced. Anshul Kumar, who lives in Hinjewadi’s Megapolis Splendour for last two-and-half years, said, “When I moved in my own flat here, it was one of the few residential societies here. Hinjewadi is well known as an IT hub in Pune and most people talk about just the traffic issues here. But, there is a lot more that needs to be done for the 50,000 plus residents living here. Basic infrastructure like water, footpath, roads, garbage segregation, sewage treatment, healthcare, security and any such basic facilities are not properly planned and given to residents.”
“I got to meet two young students who are working on a great project - Humanising Hinjewadi - as part of their final year project. It was a great presentation by these students and the idea is very well presented to cover what we, as a resident, need. The study is being done well and if departments like Pune Metropolitan Region Development Authority (PMRDA) and Maharashtra Industrial Development Corporation (MIDC) take the survey feedback seriously and implements them, it can be a game changer for residents. We appreciate the efforts taken by these young students,” Kumar added.