Hopping between Delhi, Berlin and Leipzig, I asked myself if there was any commonality between these three cities, which seemed to run civilisations of their own. They do not even start with the same sound — sadly one cannot connect them through a clumsy alliteration. The answer I temporarily settled for is hardly as mushy as initial associations with these cities often are - at present, all three cities seem to be lacerated by expansive construction sites! But the reasons for the same are interestingly different.
Berlin — the largest construction site in Europe — is being redone in an effort to come to terms with the burdens of history. As federal administration moved from Bonn to Berlin, office and housing infrastructure had to be provided for tens of thousands of government employees, law firms, associations, and political party offices. Thanks to the government's efforts to encourage investors, the Potsdamer Platz alone, for instance, had Daimler-Benz, Sony, and others agree to put up 29 buildings with 111,000 square meters of apartment space, 310,000 square meters of office space, and 57,000 square meters of retail shops and restaurants, two Imax theatres, 27 cinemas, a concert stage, an underground train station, and a grand shopping arcade. Of course this is just a fraction of the construction effort the city is witnessing. A single main train station for Berlin is being constructed besides the expansion of the underground.
Compare this to the motivations driving the constructions in Leipzig in former East Germany. Leipzig is getting a facelift - just in time to be ready to host the FIFA World Cup 2006. (So what if Leipzig lost the bid to the Olympics!) The expansion of the tram-networks will surely be over by then. However, the underground City Tunnel will keep us waiting until 2009. The tunnel, which attracted an investment of over 570 Million Euro will ensure better regional connectivity in middle Germany, considerably reducing commuting time. As though to add charm to mundane affairs, artefacts from the Renaissance were discovered during the extensive digging near the city centre.
As for Dilli, it is a matter of long-due urban planning. Delhi houses nearly thrice as many people as Berlin cramped in only 1.7 times more area. One of the most charming capitals of the world is finally putting together a chic Metro system. Also, Delhi could easily be subtitled the city of flyovers - given the number that have mushroomed in the last two years - definitely relieving the saturated roads at least somewhat.
All that notwithstanding, the experience of construction is refreshingly different in these three cities. Frankly, many areas of Delhi currently look like a dissection sample - the flesh has been removed, gutters are visible, extra fat has been tweezed out, the skeleton is being rearranged. But hey, this aesthetic mess promises that in a few years from now, you might hop on to a Metro train, drop the kids off to school and whiz along on the same train to do grocery-shopping at the swanky malls in Gurgaon.
{{/usCountry}}All that notwithstanding, the experience of construction is refreshingly different in these three cities. Frankly, many areas of Delhi currently look like a dissection sample - the flesh has been removed, gutters are visible, extra fat has been tweezed out, the skeleton is being rearranged. But hey, this aesthetic mess promises that in a few years from now, you might hop on to a Metro train, drop the kids off to school and whiz along on the same train to do grocery-shopping at the swanky malls in Gurgaon.
{{/usCountry}}As for Berlin, you can hardly make out which parts of the city are spared the shovels and cranes. It is almost as though you do not see the construction anymore because it is all over the city - next to the remains of the Wall, behind an inconsequential café, in front of the Parliament, under the bridges and over the trams. Is Berlin the modern capital of Europe still in the making?
Leipzig is microscopic when talked in the same breath as Delhi and Berlin. Construction efforts are enough to throw tram networks upside down and tarnish the city landscape to quite an extent. The May Day rally only added to the confusion as the Right and Left wing protestors decided to walk through town and blocked even the areas, which were spared by the construction sites. All trams had to be called off the tracks. People from all corners of Leipzig, struggling through blockades, meandered to the city centre on foot. There seemed to a one-to-one ratio between police and citizens. Surely, the Leipzig police finally found work that Sunday, as they water-guzzled the protestors when the hooting and confrontations of the Nazis and their opponents grew slightly feverish. It was quite a ludicrous storm in a teacup. I felt at home, reminded of the chaos created in and around Connaught Place in Delhi when one religious group or the other decides to march across the city.
It is hardly fair to tease out a single commonality between these three cities, books on which could fill three floors in a library. Surely there are many more similarities but this one, believe me, could easily top the list - you're likely to fall in love with all three cities despite their historical and aesthetic mess - partly perhaps even because of it.