The latest Economic Survey delivers a crucial message for urban planners and policymakers across India: fixing footpaths alone will not transform Indian cities into more liveable spaces. While improved pedestrian infrastructure remains necessary, the comprehensive analysis reveals that true urban liveability emerges from how cities function as integrated systems rather than from standalone infrastructure projects.
The Core Argument: People-Centric Urban Systems
According to the Survey, liveability fundamentally emerges when cities are designed around people's time, choices, and creativity rather than merely around infrastructure delivery. The document makes a compelling observation: "Globally, the most liveable cities are not necessarily the richest or newest; they are the ones that organise urban life to reduce friction, enable expression, and reward everyday participation." This perspective shifts the focus from physical assets to human experiences in urban planning.
Learning from Global Contrasts: Detroit vs. Boston
The Survey provides illuminating international comparisons to illustrate its thesis. Detroit in the United States serves as a cautionary tale - despite massive investments in highways, factories, and stadiums, the city failed to maintain economic output proportionate to its infrastructure spending, ultimately experiencing population collapse. In stark contrast, Boston demonstrates how infrastructure-light cities can thrive through alternative strengths.
Boston maintains older housing styles, narrow lanes, and limited road and flyover construction, yet it flourishes through its concentration of educational institutions and universities. This academic ecosystem has facilitated a strategic shift toward modern and emerging sectors including education, finance, and biotechnology. The Survey draws a parallel to India's own Bengaluru, which despite having insufficient physical infrastructure compared to Delhi or Mumbai, has become India's Silicon Valley by reaping agglomeration benefits from its entrepreneurial ecosystem.
The Bengaluru Model: Ecosystem Over Infrastructure
Bengaluru's remarkable growth trajectory offers crucial insights for Indian urban development. The city developed primarily through the concentration of engineering talent and institutions, complemented by wage growth and the creation of a modern urban environment. This demonstrates how ecosystem development can sometimes outweigh physical infrastructure in creating vibrant, economically productive cities.
Redefining Urban Mobility and Street Design
The Survey presents a fundamental rethinking of urban mobility, arguing that design must prioritize ease, safety, and predictability in everyday movement rather than assuming speed and private vehicles as defaults. A particularly compelling concept introduced is treating "streets as social infrastructure, not just traffic corridors."
The document advocates for street design guided by Guillermo Penalosa's "8-80" philosophy, which asserts that good streets must function equally well for both eight-year-olds and eighty-year-olds, thereby prioritizing safety, comfort, and accessibility for all citizens. This people-first approach represents a significant departure from traditional traffic-centric urban planning.
The Public Transport Imperative
Footpaths alone prove inadequate without reliable public transport, predictable enforcement, and established civic norms. The Survey cites Barcelona's superblocks as a successful global example where reclaiming streets for pedestrians has boosted community play and cultural activities. However, it notes that India's fragmented governance structures often dilute such innovative urban interventions.
Governance Deficits and Spatial Misalignment
One of the Survey's central observations identifies a critical governance and coordination deficit plaguing Indian cities. Urban residents lose valuable time not merely because of broken footpaths, but because work locations, housing, schools, healthcare facilities, and public services remain poorly aligned both spatially and temporally.
Long commutes, fragmented public transport systems, and mismatches between employment centers and residential areas impose daily friction on households. While improved footpaths might enhance the final few hundred meters of a journey, they cannot compensate for cities that suffer from fundamental spatial and economic misalignment.
Understanding Mobility as a City-Wide Challenge
The Survey emphasizes that mobility must be understood as a city-wide systemic problem rather than a street-level issue. Indian cities currently rely heavily on informal and intermediate transport modes because formal systems fail to adequately cover areas where people actually live and work. Without reliable, affordable public transport that seamlessly integrates walking, cycling, and mass transit, pedestrian infrastructure remains underutilized or unsafe.
A particularly insightful recommendation stresses that truly liveable cities should reduce the need for travel altogether by bringing opportunities closer to people through better urban planning and mixed-use development.
Managing Informality in Urban India
Another recurring theme addresses the informal nature of urban India, where a substantial share of economic activity, housing, and service delivery operates outside formal planning frameworks. Street vendors spill onto pavements, utilities are laid without proper coordination, and streets become contested spaces with competing claims.
In this context, footpaths frequently face encroachment or repurposing. The Survey suggests that achieving liveability requires managing informality through thoughtful design and regulation rather than treating footpaths as isolated engineering assets. This approach acknowledges the reality of India's urban ecosystems while working to improve them systematically.
Basic Services as Foundation for Liveability
The document importantly links urban liveability to the quality of fundamental urban services. Water supply systems, sanitation infrastructure, waste management protocols, and drainage networks shape daily urban life far more directly than cosmetic improvements or standalone infrastructure projects. These basic services form the essential foundation upon which other aspects of urban liveability can be built.
The Economic Survey ultimately presents a holistic vision for Indian urban development - one that moves beyond piecemeal infrastructure fixes toward integrated, people-centered urban systems that reduce daily friction, enable creative expression, and reward civic participation.
