The Shifting Aesthetic and the Function of Urban Transport Systems as a Symbol of Modernity:
A study of the Bangalore Metro Rail Project
Introduction
Since its transformation from the small South Asian village of Bengaḷūru to the thriving metropolis it is today, Bangalore has undergone massive urban growth and spatial reconfigurations. Since the 1970’s, the city has evolved from a small town, largely focused on industrial manufacturing, to a globally recognized Electronics City that specializes in high-technology products and the service-sector.1 The 1990s solidified this shift with the infamous Information Technology (IT) boom, bringing with it a population boom that now ranks Bangalore as India’s third most populous city.2 As James Heitzman writes in The City in South Asia, such expansion incurs numerous changes, the most pressing of which is the need to spatially accommodate such a vast population.3 The spotlight on Bangalore as “a model for the [Indian] nation,” and the growing number of residents and commuters in the city, has significantly raised the amount of traffic congestion, reduced the area of available living space and heightened the socio-spatial tensions that accompany these changes.4
With a population of over 6 billion, an estimated 1,500 new private vehicles registered in Bangalore each day5 and the road congestion, traffic accidents and increased travel time that accompany these markers of urban growth, the Government of Karnataka has recently approved the renovation of Bangalore’s Mass Rapid Transit System (MRTS) and the construction of the Bangalore Metro Rail Project (BMRP)6. The Metro is an elevated light rail that runs North-South and East-West through the heart of the city,7 going through many of its commercial hubs.8 While the idea of an inner-city rail line has existed since the 1980s,9 its transition from idea to actuality was pushed forward in 2006, shortly following the successful completion of the Delhi Metro Rail. Currently, the eastern corridor of the BMRP, which stretches from Mahatma Gandhi (MG) Road to Baiyyappanhalli Road, is almost complete and is due to begin running as early as December 2010.10 This particular segment of the route encompasses many highly trafficked roads and neighborhoods, with construction causing substantial problems and inconveniences for those who live, work and travel along its line.
Research Question
Road widening, land acquisition and construction have compounded the problems of urban growth and spatial contestations as Bangalorians vie for access to and through the roadways. While in Bangalore for a study abroad program last year, my classmates and I were able to work with a local NGO called the Environmental Support Group (ESG), and were exposed to several examples of Bangalore’s growth and the underlying issues of space management and social justice that have accompanied them. One of these issues was the construction of the BMRP. As a part of our investigation, we visited several areas undergoing Metro construction and conducted informal interviews around the city. Two sites, in particular, illustrated the myriad effects, both positive and negative, of the Metro on the city and its citizens.
MG Road and Chinmaya Mission Hospital (CMH) Road are both sites that the Metro crosses through along the eastern leg of the route. CMH Road was a particularly interesting site to investigate, as it is a highly-trafficked commercial hub in the city. As of August 2009, when I was last in Bangalore, the road itself was completely torn apart, with large cement columns occupying the center of the road, heavy machinery and equipment strewn about the street and holes in the concrete spaced precariously every few steps. The footpath was non-existent, so the roadwork crept up to the very doorsteps of the small shops and apartment buildings that lined the street. Walking was a challenge in itself, which made the scarcity of people on this usually-busy street painfully apparent.
One shop keeper I spoke with said that he had noticed a 50-60% drop in business since Metro construction began, with similar circumstance echoed by many of the other business owners lining CMH Road. Further conversations with Bangalorians around the city revealed numerous other effects of the Metro: safety hazards with road widening and construction efforts,11 problems with land acquisition,12 noise pollution, environmental degradation,13 and high costs,14 to name a few. Furthermore, with tickets to ride the Metro at a projected cost of 7 – 15 Rs., which is almost double that of local bus fares,15 projected ridership is low and predictions of a severe loss in revenue abound.16 A study conducted by Sanjeev Aundhe falls in line with the claims that the BMRP will not achieve the desired reduction of the number of vehicles on the road, that it is not very cost effective and that it “will not relieve congestion or decrease private car usage.”17 The same study shows that approximately 60 percent of passenger trips are made on buses, with bicycles counting for another 18 percent, calling into question why more attention is not paid to focusing on the improvement of these existing forms of transportation, given that over three fourths of the population uses them.18 In addition to the predominance of other forms of public transportation, which are more affordable and accessible to a higher percentage of the population, concerns about ridership are further heightened with an examination of the Delhi Metro. When the Delhi Metro began running in 2005, expected ridership was 1.5 million passenger trips per day. As of 2006, after more than a year of being in service, the system only had about 450,000 passengers per day, a number that has grown in the four years since then but has yet to hit the original target.19 Given that the Delhi Metro took over five years to even come close to its original expected ridership, fears that the same will happen with the Bangalore Metro are perhaps not unfounded.
Despite the negative aspects of the Metro, however, I was shocked to find that the vast majority of the people I spoke with were still excited about the BMRP.20 Even those shopkeepers and business owners along CMH Road that had suffered substantial losses and were worried about business picking back up again even after the Metro was complete, still expressed a sense of pride and optimism regarding the Metro. Several citizens referenced the Delhi Metro Rail and their enthusiasm for having something similar in their own city. Even with the high overhead costs and (relatively) expensive ticketing projections, which many people I spoke with claimed would be too high for them to afford, citizens from along the spectrum of Bangalore’s economic, religious and social strata seemed supportive, even excited, about the existence of the Metro in the city. Why, given the plethora of negative effects that Metro construction is having throughout the city, the low projected ridership, high use of alternate forms of transport and the inaccessibility of the Metro due to cost, do many citizens support the Bangalore Metro Rail Project?
Hypothesis
To explain why there is seemingly such widespread support for the construction of the Metro, notwithstanding the negative consequences with regard to spatial, economic and social mobility for many citizens who will most likely not even use it as a form of transportation, I will argue that the Metro functions as an aesthetic marker of taste: more than just a means of transportation, the Metro constitutes a Bourdieuian form of symbolic capital that signifies congruence with Bangalore’s changing image into a modern, developed city.21
In The Promise of the Metropolis, Janaki Nair argues that Bangalore’s development into a “modern metropolis,” dominated by high-technology manufacturing, has been mirrored by an equally radical transformation into a “space of flows,” into a city to “move through, rather than be in.”22 These notions are echoed by the rhetoric surrounding the Bangalore Metro by the Bangalore Metro Rail Company Ltd. (BMRCL), with slogans such as "Namma Metro. Driving Bangalore Ahead" and "For a Bangalore that's on the move.”23 Attendant upon the ever-growing prominence of the IT industry is a push towards spatial reconfigurations that will support and sustain a fast-paced, industrialized city, with an aesthetically suitable built environment to match.24
The high visibility of Bangalore as the capital of India’s IT sector has fueled this transformation, as the socio-spatial construction of the city has been “produced and reproduced in connection with the forces of production (and with the relations of production).”25 Comparisons of Bangalore to other centers of urban growth and prosperity, such as Delhi and Singapore, in addition to the city’s reputation as the “Silicon Valley” of India have further informed the nature of these spatial adjustments.26 As Stallmeyer notes in his comparison of Bangalore and Silicon Valley, CA, Bangalore’s “physical space is being reshaped by a globalized representation of Silicon Valley tradition,” which is visible in “the urban entrepreneurial policies, which capitalize on this imagery and are meant ‘to promote the comparative advantage of the city relative to other cities which may be competing for similar investments.’” 27 The representations of Bangalore as an IT city must therefore promote the city as equivalent to other high-tech centers in order to compete on the international level.
Conformity with these idealistic and visually-based notions of an IT city has prompted Bangalore to upgrade, with the Metro as paradigmatic of this push for progress in the attempt to transcend its traditional depictions as a “large, very poor [city]…oriented toward walking and public transport.”28 I will argue that these concerns and the movement to alter the spatial configuration of Bangalore’s urban landscape to match the visual perceptions of what a developed city “should” look like are indicative of a shift in aesthetic taste. As Leela Fernandes notes in India’s New Middle Class, “representation of changing tastes is also linked to the restructuring of urban space,”29 which the Metro is certainly accomplishing with the massive effects that the construction is inflicting upon city streets. The role of an attractive and efficient transportation system is key to Bangalore’s transformation into the gleaming “Silicon Valley” it aspires to be, as “the evolution of transport has always been linked to economic development.”30 The specific spectacality of the Metro as highly visible, above-ground transit system “combines the city’s reality with its ideality, embracing the practical, the symbolic and the imaginary” in its aesthetic manifestation and the subsequent meanings attached to it.31
The construction of the Metro reflects broader trends in Bangalore of “trading space with time and thus money,”32 for the goal of transportation is “to transform the geographical attributes of freight, people or information, from an origin to a destination, conferring them an added value in the process,” by reducing the amount of time it takes to move from one place to another.33 Time is money in a booming city like Bangalore and saving time by bypassing space is seen as a clear indication of progress.34 The ability to move quickly and efficiently through the city is indicative of economic success, as slower forms of transportation, such as walking or cycling, can be a sign of economic disadvantage since only the wealthier segments of the population are able to afford faster modes of transport, such as cars, motorcycles and, soon, the Metro.
In its capacity as “a public institution, expressive of social relations, status, prestige and honor,” 35 I will argue that the use of the Metro serves as symbolic capital for the rider and confers upon him/her a mechanism for social differentiation, indicating “the acquisition and maintenance of power.”36 Operating under Bourdieu’s argument that all individuals aspire to attain capital, and thus power, the Metro serves not only a symbol of established power, but also as a “volley shot in an attempt to acquire power.”37 As an aesthetic model of economic success and a “monument of high technology,” the Metro is a tangible example of what the city, and those within it, can accomplish.38 As Nair states in her discussion of Bangalore’s city spaces, “the sphere of the symbolic is thus the sphere within which accumulation of a different kind occurs, an accumulation of symbolic capital, often among those denied other forms of capital accumulation.”39 Through my research I will attempt to establish that the widespread support for the Metro, especially among those who claim that they will not be able to afford to ride the Metro, is indicative of an aspiration to one day be able to do so and to thus acquire the symbolic capital imbued within this action.
The Metro’s function as symbolic capital operates on two levels: it is indicative of the social and economic disparities within Bangalore’s population, while at the same time it naturalizes this disparity as it frames the economic success of the IT industry as a legitimate social order. My argument suggests that the Metro functions both as an instrument of differentiation as well as unification, precisely because its imposition of categories of thought and perception of space upon the citizens of Bangalore converges in an aesthetic ideal that is accepted as just. As Nair succinctly comments, “At a time when the instrumentalities of the state (the judicial or the planning apparatuses) are skillfully deployed by those possessed of a vision of modernity, the untidy often violent spatial strategies of political society may well ‘re-territorialize’ space that has been ‘de-territorialized’ by the globalization of capital.”40 The ‘re-territorializing’ of street spaces for Metro construction and the complicit nature of many Bangalorians despite the myriad negative effects, as demonstrated by the general feelings of support and optimism for the Metro, is further demonstrative of the presence of symbolic violence within the city.
Literature Review
Three bodies of literature will inform the direction of my thesis at this time. First I will investigate the scholarship surrounding transport geography, which will serve as a useful tool for understanding the transformations inherent in Bangalore’s urban development. Second, I explore scholarship devoted to issues of power and symbolic capital as a means to frame the social dynamics affected by Metro construction. Finally, I review the scholarship surrounding the aesthetics of modernity, its influences and the forms that it takes.
Transport Geography
The first portion of my literature review examines the role of transportation in Bangalore and the changes it has undergone in conjunction with larger movements of urban development. An excellent starting point for developing such a framework is the work by Jean Paul Rodrigues, Claude Comtois and Brian Slack in, The Geography of Transport Systems. This work details the development of transportation systems as a “continuous challenge to satisfy mobility needs, to support economic development and to participate in the global economy.”41 Transportation as a function of urban development likewise manifests itself as an exchange for space with time, and thus money.42 Rodrigue et al.’s observation that, “the unique purpose of transportation is to overcome space,”43 iterates the notion that development in Bangalore has rendered it “a space for the unimpeded flow of commodities, people and information…a space ‘to move through’ rather than ‘be in,’”44 as set out by Janaki Nair.
The discussion by Rodrigue et al. of the role of transportation in shaping social interactions, how distinctions are often based on the ability to move through space, and the equation of this movement with economic status, will greatly inform my investigation of the use of the Metro as symbolic capital. The scholarly article, “From Bangalore to the Bay Area: comparing transportation and activity accessibility to drivers of urban growth” by Michael Reilly, Margaret O’Mara and Karen Seto, sets forth the argument that Bangalore, like “many Asian developing nations,” has adopted Western, “modern” ways of living and has reflected these changes in its urban growth pattern and the spatial divisions inherent within it.45
As the IT industry has taken flight and the population and boundaries of the city have expanded, so too has the use of private vehicles. This influx is indicative of the trend towards atomized, car-dependent nodes that often accompany increased commercial and residential activity, which in turn drastically shapes the development of public transportation infrastructure.46 G.S. Sastry has also investigated the development issues of Greater Bangalore and the emergence of transport management, which has resulted in the increased significance of newer, more efficient means of transportation to match the quickening pace of the city. Just as “the development of a location reflects the cumulative relationships between transport infrastructure, economic activities and the built environment,”47 the development of the Metro is becoming necessary “in order to carry on various time-bound urban activities”48 that accompany these economic activities. Indeed, issues of accessibility and the rapidity with which an individual is able to traverse space is a key piece of my discussions of the Metro as a symbol of modernity and success.
Power and Symbolic Capital
My focus on the idea of Bangalore as a “space of flows,” will be further informed by the function of the Metro as a symbol of modernity, with the aid of Bourdieuian notions of power and symbolic capital. The potency of these heuristic devices is manifested in numerous works, including Vijayendra Rao’s article, “Symbolic Public Goods in India and Indonesia,” in which he establishes the concept of Symbolic Public Goods (SPGs) as common property resources, accessible to a given population, that have “both symbolic and material functions” in society.49 This description, especially when put into conversation with the concept of symbolic capital, resonates with my interpretation of the Metro. Rao’s discussion of how “shifts in the relative power of groups, or in information technologies, or in the nature of the state can result in the formation of new SPGs that compete with existing forms to establish new circles of power,” is especially relevant to my argument.50 That is, I will suggest that the value signaled by the use of the Metro constitutes its function as symbolic capital for the way it is “grasped through categories of perception that recognize its specific logic...”51 Furthermore, as Leela Fernandes recognizes in her discussion of the accumulation of symbolic capital, “the acquisition of particular kinds of social and cultural capital (including particular kinds of credentials, skills, lifestyle distinction, and aesthetic/cultural knowledge),” such as the Metro, is often used by individuals to negotiate their position within the social strata of the city.52
Nair’s discussion of power structures in Bangalore coincides with many of these arguments. She too recognizes the equation of faster and more modern means of transportation with economic success. However, where Nair diverts from similar theories put forth by scholars such as Rao and Ananya Roy, as well as the argument I will put forth in my thesis, is on the issue of citizenship in relation to these symbols. While Nair contends that the connection between symbolic occupations of city space with re-articulations of notions of ‘citizenship,’ and argues that the differences emphasized by relative access to Symbolic Public Goods serves to degrade a collective identity, I will argue that the Metro actually supports notions of a collective identity, and that the divisions among the population in terms of who does and does not possess such capital is denotative of the existence of symbolic violence, as those who do not possess the symbolic capital still support the existence of the Metro in the city and aspire to use it.
The Aesthetics of Modernity
The Metro is only the newest addition to the city aesthetic and Bangalore’s recasting as a “space of flows.” The function of the Metro extends “well beyond the boundaries of the purely economic, to build up a pervasive ideology of success,” inextricably bound to the changing tastes of Bangalore’s growing middle class and their visual manifestations.53 Henry Lefebvre’s discussion of the “spectacle of space” is a useful conceptual tool in understanding the aesthetic role of the Metro in Bangalore as it “combines the city’s reality with its ideality, embracing the practical, the symbolic and the imaginary.”54 The connection between the changing nature of production in the city, as it shifted from industrial manufacturing to a service-dominated urban economy, which Partha Chatterjee sees as indicative of the growth of a metropolis,55 is echoed in Lefebvre when he states that “social space is produced and reproduced in connection with the forces of production.”56
My hypothesis that the construction of the Metro operates as a symbol for modernity and progress, as opposed to simply constituting a solution to problems of congestion and crowded roads, is further informed by the theories of the “aesthetic icon” proposed by Ananya Roy.57 Roy’s argument that the idea of the modern coincides with the idea of progress and influences its operation in both time and space, ultimately promoting its need to “put itself on display,” is congruent with my assertions that the Metro, too, is “put on display” as an elevated MRTS.58 The necessary contrast between the old and the new to differentiate the “modern” from the “traditional” that Roy also addresses is further elaborated upon by John Stallmeyer’s argument that the contrast between Silicon Valley, CA and Bangalore as the “Silicon Valley of India” greatly contributed to the physical changes in its the urban landscape. The images of Silicon Valley “portrayed and transmitted through an increasingly globalized media…constitutes a tradition invoked by other locations aspiring to ‘Silicon Valley’ status,”59 and adds to the international pressure on Bangalore to conform to visual indications of development.60 The competition inherent within the aspirations for Bangalore, relative to the other up-and-coming cities worldwide that Stallmeyer elaborates upon, will also factor into my discussion of the Metro as a symbol of modernity.
The portrayal of Bangalore as a “modern city” is perceived to be highly contingent on its physical appearance and built environment.61 Leela Fernandes expands upon such notions in her discussion of shifting aesthetic tastes to be in line with the “politics of style associated with the new middle class”62 noting that a “representation of changing tastes is also linked to the restructuring of urban space.”63 While Fernandes focuses largely on the role of India’s emerging middle class as the primary reason for these changing aesthetics and their manifestations in the reorganization and restructuring of urban space, I will argue more in line with Nair in advocating that while the middle class certainly does play a role, it is not the sole motivation, but rather works in tandem with the global imagery discussed by Stallmeyer. While I agree with Bourdieu’s argument that aesthetic judgment is “an immanently social faculty, resulting from class upbringing and education,”64 I will problematize his and Fernandes’ assertions that only the elite and middle class can determine the course of the changing aesthetic. I will argue instead that while the upper classes certainly do play a role, in the case of Bangalore, lower class aesthetic tastes are changing in line with those of the elite, resulting in the support for the Metro.
Methodology
My approach to this issue will consist of 1.) a thorough analysis of the scholarship surrounding urban development and transportation, in relation to conceptions of modernity, aesthetic taste and symbolic capital and 2.) observation of Metro construction in Bangalore, an examination of the rhetoric surrounding it in newspapers, blogs and on websites and interviews with citizens of Bangalore, particularly those who live, work and frequently traverse MG and CMH Road. I will use Bourdieu's theoretical conceptions of symbolic capital and the aesthetic to inform my analysis of these sources in order to investigate the reasoning behind the widespread support for the Bangalore Metro, despite the myriad negative effects on the city and many of its inhabitants.
Scholarly Sources
I will first evaluate scholarly articles and books that address the development of urban transportation systems in developing nations in order to evaluate comparatively what is taking place in Bangalore. I will research the transportation systems in Singapore and Delhi in particular, as both of these locations have comparable urban circumstances to Bangalore. In examining each of these sites, I will pay particular attention to how authors present the unique perceptions of modernity present in each city, the physical, aesthetic forms that these perceptions manifest themselves in and the means by which they emerge in the built environment of these places over time. By doing so, I will ascertain the influence of global, visual projections of what development should look like in order to better understand the international aesthetic influences at work in Bangalore.
I will also review literature pertaining to the specific development of Bangalore, tracking the changes that have occurred in the city over the past few decades in order to gain an understanding of how the built environment has changed over time. Scholarly sources on Bangalore’s development will also help me to contextualize the Metro within the larger economic movements of the city and their effects on urban space. Bourdieu’s work on public taste and aesthetic judgment, as he addresses issues of power, dominance and socio-cultural production, will also be used a tool of analysis within these bodies of scholarship. The role of symbolic capital in creating distinctions and divisions among populations will be examined through an analysis of the words and phrases used to describe public infrastructure projects, particularly those involving transportation.
Field Research
My second source of data will come from field work in Bangalore over the summer. I will observe the effects of Metro construction on two streets along the eastern leg of the route, MG Road and CMH Road, and conduct interviews with citizens in these locations. I will also interviews government officials who have participated in the BMRP and employees of Namma Metro in order to gain a balanced perspective from individuals involved in planning, implementation and use. I will also examine three sources of media: newspapers, blogs and websites, in order to ascertain how the Metro is being portrayed in publicly accessible sources.
Once in Bangalore, I will visit roads and neighborhoods along the eastern leg of the Metro, specifically MG Road and CMH Road, 65 where construction is finishing up and the Metro is due to begin running this December.66 I will document and observe the conditions of road itself, in its intended capacity, and the effect of the Metro on mobility, traffic and spatial interactions. In doing so, I hope to gain perspective on the physical consequences of the Metro’s construction and see how the complete and incomplete portions of it effects different people using the road. As part of this observation, I will keep a photo journal and attempt to find old photographs of MG and CMH road in order to build a visual timeline of its progression over the last five years.67 I will examine the changes in the spatial configuration of these roads and document the progress of urban development over time.
Human Subjects Research
In addition to visual observation, while in Bangalore I will interview individuals that live, work and frequently travel along MG Road and CMH Road. I will also interview government official who have been involved with the BMRP and employees of Namma Metro.68 I plan to speak with as many people as I am able, from a wide variety of social, economic and cultural circumstances in order to 1.) assess support for the Metro over a wide variety of social categories and 2.) get as many perspectives as possible so that my analysis is balanced. In this endeavor I will be limited by my lack of language abilities, but I will have a translator69 to help me to speak with portions of the population that I otherwise would not be able to. Since I will be interacting with human subjects and using these interviews as a part of my research, I will be going through the Institutional Review Board (IRB) at the UW in order to obtain permission from the Humans Subjects Review Committee to conduct these interviews.70 It is my hope that the data and testimonies collected from these interviews will shed more light on the numerous opinions and attitudes towards the Metro and what it means for different segments of Bangalore’s population.71 Additionally, in order to strengthen my question, I hope to develop some means of quantifying or measuring “support” for the Metro.
Rhetoric in Media, Blogs and Websites
Finally, I plan to do a thorough examination of the public discourse contiguous to the Metro since 2006,72 in order to gauge the public sentiment surrounding its construction. This will include an examination and analysis of news articles, blogs and websites pertaining to the Bangalore Metro. I will utilize the internet as a means to access these sources, along with the archives of ESG and local libraries.73 My analysis is open to other forms of public discussion, should I find them, as I realize that an analysis of this nature excludes portions of the population74 and that I will be largely limited to the English forms of these media. I will have a translator75 for portions of my research and will certainly attempt to utilize this resource however, since I cannot speak Kannada or Tamil fluently, I will be limited in the sources that I am able to analyze on my own. In those sources that I can examine, I will pay particular attention to the words and phrases that individuals and institutions76 use to describe the Metro, their opinions about it and their feelings about what it means for themselves, for Bangalore and for India.
Analysis
In order to evaluate interviews, newspaper articles, blogs and websites for evidence of aesthetic taste, symbolic capital, and symbolic violence I will have to do a close reading and analysis of these sources. I will pay particular attention to the descriptive terms that people use both in interviews I conduct and from the interviews, opinions and quotations from the sources of media listed above. I will look to see if there is a fixation on visual elements of the Metro when people talk about it and evaluate this for indications of aesthetic taste, paying attention to the physical, visual elements of the Metro that people bring up.
To investigate the function of the Metro as symbolic capital, I will evaluate how interviewees answer the questions of “Who will ride the Metro and why?” and “Who will not ride the Metro and why?” for markers of economic and class distinctions. For example, do interviewees equate income level with the ability to ride the Metro? Do interviewees identify a particular economic status in answering this question? How do they differentiate between who will and will not ride the Metro? I will also examine how they answer the question, “What does it mean that the Metro is being built here?” and analyze their responses for denotations of any significance and symbolism attached to the Metro in terms of its function as a divisive mechanism. I will also evaluate answers and discussions surrounding the Metro for marks of complicity, indifference, rebellion, indignation, etc. in order to ascertain the presence of symbolic violence.
Conclusion
It is undeniable that the city of Bangalore, and indeed all of India, is undergoing profound changes to its urban landscapes and socio-spatial configurations. The Metro is just one indication of the subsequent alterations in the means of transportation and movement through spaces, as well as the meanings attached to this movement, within the larger economic and social changes occurring. My research will attempt to provide but one possible explanation of the paradoxical reactions to these transformations.
Works Cited
University of Chicago Press, 1992.
Chatterjee, Partha. “Are Indian Cities Becoming Bourgeois at Last?” in Contested
- Transformations: Changing Economies and Identities in Contemporary India. Ed. by May, E. John, Praveen Kumar Jha and Surinder S. Jodhka. New Delhi: Tulika Books, 2006, 113 – 124.
Reform. Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press, 2006.
Heitzman, James. Network City: Planning the Information Society in Bangalore. Oxford: Oxford
University Press, 2004.
Heitzman, James. The City in South Asia. New York: Routledge 2008.
Lefebvre, Henry. The Production of Space. Oxford: Blackwell, 1996.
Nair, Janika. The Promise of the Metropolis: Bangalore’s Twentieth Century. New Delhi:
Oxford University Press, 2005.
Nari, Janaki. “‘Social Municipalism’ and the New Metropolis,” in Contested Transformations:
Changing Economies and Identities in Contemporary India. Ed. by May, E. John,
Praveen Kumar Jha and Surinder S. Jodhka, New Delhi; Tulika Book, 2006, 125 - 146.
Pai, Madhav. “Ahmedabad takes the bus.” India Together, May 17, 2006. http://www.indiatogether.org/
Polgreen, Lydia. “In India, Hitching Hopes on a Subway.” The New York Times, May 13, 2010. http://www.nytimes.com/2010/
Ramesh, B.S. “BMRCL Unrelenting, 1,800 Trees in Lalbagh Face the Axe.” The Hindu, April 19, 2009. http://www.hindu.com/2009/04/
Rao, Vijayendra. “Symbolic Public Goods in India and Indonesia”, in The Contested Commons:
Conversations between Economists and Anthropologists. Ed. by Pranab Bardham and Isha Ray. Oxford: Blackwell Publishing, 2008, 168-186.
Reilly, Michael, Margaret O’Mara and Karen Seto, “From Bangalore to the Bay Area:
Comparing transportation and activity accessibility as drivers of urban growth,” Landscape and Urban Planning 92 (2009): 24-33, http://www.ihdp.unu.edu/file/
Rodrigue, Jean-Paul, Claude Comtois and Brian Slack, The Geography of Transport Systems New York: Routledge, 2009.
- http://www.geog.umontreal.ca/
York: Routledge, 2004, 63-86.
Sastry, G. S. Emerging Development Issues of Greater Bangalore. New Delhi: Institute for
Social and Economic Change, 2008.
Stallmeyer, John. “New Silicon Valleys; Informatization, Globalization and Tradition in
Bangalore, India,” in Transitory Sites: Mapping Dubai’s ‘Forgotten’ Urban Public
- Spaces. Ed. by Yasser Elsheshtawy, New York: Traditional Dwellings and Settlements Working Paper Series, 2006.
Allied Publishers Primate Limited, 1979.
Wacquant, Loïc. “PIERRE BOURDIEU” in Key Contemporary Thinkers. Ed. by Rob Stones,
- London and New York; Macmillan, new edition, 2006. http://docs.google.com/viewer?
(May 18, 2010).
“Bangalore Metro Rail: Alignment 1.” http://www.
“Delhi Metro Ridership Crosses 800,000 Passengers” Thaindian News, July 30, 2008. http://www.thaindian.com/
“India: Largest Cities and Towns and Statistics of their Population.” World Gazeteer. http://www.world-gazetteer.
“Land Row: Metro Wins a Major Battle.” Deccan Herald, March 19, 2009. http://www.deccanherald.com/
“Metro – Coverage Comparison with Some Cities.” Praja. March 6, 2009. http://praja.in/en/~bangalore/
“Namma Metro: Driving Bangalore Ahead.” This Week Bangalore, May 2010. http://www.thisweekbangalore.
“Namma Metro is Safe.” Deccan Herald, October 26, 2009. http://www.deccanherald.com/
