2. Literature review
2.4 Examples
2.4.1 Case study: Jaipur
51 8. ‘Outside the house and touching it there should be planted a foot-path (Vithika),
which should be as wide as one-third of the breadth of the house.’
Mansara suggests to place raised footpath on both sides of the streets. Such footpath formed an inseparable part of the house.
9. ‘All houses should face the royal roads and at their backs there should be Vithis or narrow lanes to allow passage for removal of offals and night-soil.’
The interesting feature of this bye-law, which has been reflected in other treaties as well as in old extant buildings is that, the doors never opened on the roads.
The rule for intervening spaces between two buildings is useful for ensuring sanitation.
From the above mentioned bye-laws, it is evident that co-operation between building construction and town-planning had long been practiced since Vedic period.
52 Bhattacharya (ষ্টেদযাধর ভট্টাচাযু), a Brahman scholar from Bengal, as the civic architect who planned the city following the principles of Shilpa Shsastra and Vastu Shasra (োস্তুশাস্ত্র).
Figure 2.9: Formation of Axis in Jaipur (Nongrum, 2008)
Although, the Vedic treaties strictly suggest to orient the settlements following the cardinal directions, the axes of Jaipur are a little tilted due to the topographic situation.
The planning of the city began with marking two principal axes. A straight line of the ridge along the west-east axis was suggested as the major thoroughfare and the topography could be used to its potential in terms of drainage by placing a road along this axis. Along the north-south axis, the road was planned to connect the Jaigarh fort towards the north to Sanganer, the trading town (Figure 2.9). The point of intersection of these roads at right angles created the city’s main cross-roads (chaupar).
53 As stated earlier, according to the rules of Padavinyasa, the site can be divided into a number of squares. The site of Jaipur was primarily divided into a grid of 3x3 squares, the gridlines being the city’s main streets. The north-west square was not possible to be allocated due to topographic reason and hence, an additional square was placed at the south-east. Each of these squares measures almost 800x800m. The squares were further divided into wards or muhallas by means of lanes and alleys following the layout of the village type Prastara.
The central axis as well as the main road was laid from east to west between the gates of the sun (suraj pol; িূরজ বপাল) and moon (chand pol; চাাঁদ বপাল). The central two squares at the north of this road was occupied with the royal palaces and state offices. The south of this road contained four almost equal squares. The one opposite to the palace was divided into two rectangles by introducing a road along the north-south axis which is called chara rasta (চার রাস্তা). These five southern blocks are termed as Chowkris (বচৌকষ্টি). Lanes and streets named after occupations of inhabitants suggests the initial distribution of wards following the principles of Padavinyasa. The width of the primary, secondary and tertiary streets are found to be 111ft, 55ft and 27ft respectively. The corresponding Vedic units are 18.5 dandas, 9.1 dandas and 4.5 dandas.
The intersections of the major roads are termed as Chaupars (বচৌপাি) , which measures almost 100x100m. These are used for public gathering on festive occasions. The distance between two Chaupars is almost 700m, which is a tolerable distance in terms if pedestrian movement. Historically, the Chaupars contained outlets of water for intense social use in order to ensure water supply. These infrastructure were connected with underground aqueducts. The major streets housed the main markets, havelis and temples. The street elevation was strictly designed to be uniform. Therefore, these main streets and Chaupars have a social interface even today. Use of sunshades (Chhajjas), colonnaded arcades and delicate lattice screens (Jali; জাষ্টল) shows the effort to reduce heat in semi-outdoor spaces (Singh, 2013).
54
Figure 2.10 (a): Order of streets within the second chowkri from the right at south of Jaipur (Nongram, 2008)
Figure 2.10 (b): Zoning within the second chowkri from the right at south of Jaipur (Nongram, 2008)
Figure 2.10 (c): Section of main street (Nongram, 2008)
55 The streets and Chowks (central open urban squares) of the Chowkries with numerous wards or muhallas were not predetermined. Therefore, the internal cadastral pattern of these Chowkries displays a combination of planned and organic urban fabric.
The height of the built forms were regulated by the width of the streets. Although the Vedic building bye-laws suggest a maximum of eleven storeys, the early buildings of Jaipur have a maximum of four storeys.
Figure 2.11: Built and Unbuilt areas in the second chowkri from the right at south of Jaipur
Primary analysis of the Chowkri located at the west of the isolated one reveals the ratio of built and unbuilt portion of the block to be 57.86% and 42.14% respectively (figure:
2.11). The chowkri has all the four types of buildings mentioned in the bye-laws: the ekasala, dwi-sala, tri-sala and chatusala. Among the built-forms the apparent buildings with courtyards (chatusala) occupies 37.79%, the U-shaped buildings or trisala occupies 15.46%, L-shaped dwi-sala occupies 17.81% and I-shaped ekasala occupies 28.94%. The internal neighbourhood blocks adjacent to the major streets are dominated by the buildings with courtyard and the peripheral blocks are mostly occupied with the linear buildings. However, randomly selected neighbourhood blocks reveals that they act as a solid mass in terms of air flow with negligible or no porosity as the internal
56 gaps or setbacks between buildings are irregular and there are no means of quantifying the thorough fissures within these urban blocks. The building along the major streets are also placed adjacent to each other forming a horizontal streetscape with no setbacks between them.