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Experiments in anti-zoning


This project redevelops an abandoned mill site, and uses the mill’s footprint as the central open space and organizing feature of a phased redevelopment proposal. The development is an experiment with a novel paradigm, which we termed “antizoning:” a form of development that celebrates Kolkata’s dense and dynamic urban fabric. The proposal embraces flexibility and organic growth over a long-term development timeline. The organic development around the carved-out mill building is structured and guided through tactical infrastructure development.

This proposal was part of a semester-long project in an urban design studio at MIT. Working with architecture students, we were asked to develop an urban design proposal for a single jute mill in Kolkata. My partners (an architect and an urban planner) and I, chose to develop a proposal for Surah Jute Mill, the only jute mill in the metropolitan region that is landlocked. Read more about this project here, on the MIT Architecture website. Drawings made in collaboraiton with Angie Door and Gabriela Zayas del Rio.



Our proposal was based on a phased approach, for which we also drew up rough financials. The first phase would set up three infrastructural systems that would physically limit the freeform development in the subsequent phases. Surah after 20 years of antizoned development. We don’t fully know what the Surah will look like at the end of 20 years, and this is largely the point of the development approach: by not fully preconceiving what the end-state of the site look like, we avoid locking the project into a design and development plan that cannot accommodate future uses of space. A view into the central open space. Rendering by Angie Door. The first infrastructural system that will govern the “antizoned” development is the street grid, which is drawn around the footprint of the mill and is based on existing street patterns in the area. The second infrastructural system that guides development is a network of bridges and roofs that links economic hubs on the site to each other and to regional trade flows. Two typologies of connectivity are physical manifestations of larger regional flows: Bridges are used to connect buildings. Roofs are used as communal space shared between buildings These two typologies both act as anti-zoning elements by limiting further building and protecting open space. Water towers and a bridge guide physical development and provide essential infrastructures that support this growth. The third infrastructural system that supports and guides development is on-site water collection and treatment. The buildings themselves would be part of this functional system: water would be collected on buildings’ roofs, and stored in water towers that dot the site. The water would be treated in a series of treatment tanks that would be placed in Surah’s central open space. Water treatment and recreation in the former mill turned central open space. Rendering by Angie Door.