The 2011 census report indicates a population of more than 12 million people in the city of Mumbai, India, over an area of 427 km2. The Comprehensive Transportation Study of 2008 for the city and its region revealed that 51% of all trips (vehicular and nonmotorized) were made by walking and 78.2% of purely vehicular trips were made by public transportation. This high usage of public transportation and walking modes was a result of dense, mixed-use neighborhoods that traditionally agglomerated around suburban railway stations. Planning, implementation, and operations of mass transportation systems, however, are handled by agencies other than the city municipal corporation that plans land use and its regulation. Coordination between these agencies is typically a challenge and results in poor integration of transport and land use. High transit dependency and ridership have prompted city stakeholders to presume that Mumbai has naturally, over the years, adapted to transit stations; although this presumption is probably true, current realities indicate a worrisome trend. Regulations set out in the existing development plan greatly incentivize ownership of private vehicles, with excessive sops available to build parking structures, even close to railway stations. Suburbs are incentivized to proliferate in a bid to decongest the old city areas. Metro- and monorail alignments are under construction without consideration of integrating land use. This paper argues that current regulations incentivize vehicles and built densities around transit nodes. A dire need exists to rethink these regulations and develop a comprehensive transit-oriented development approach to managing high population densities around transit nodes.

Bengaluru City’s Peripheral Ring Road (PRR), a project announced back in 2005 has faced several impediments to its implementation largely due to land acquisition hurdles and associated cost overruns. This paper addresses the state of the practice in the way the ring road has been imagined, why the project has remained unimplemented in over a decade and the possible alternatives by which it could be better planned and financed. Findings suggest that the crux of the problem could be attributed to a failure in recognising the full potential of a ring road to the city. Envisioned as a mere bypass to ‘decongest an already crowded Outer Ring Road (ORR), to prevent long distance private vehicles from entering the city centre’ its potential for area development, planned urban expansion and to serve as an ideal tool for land value capture were not recognised. Experiences of other cities which have been more successful in implementing similar projects through the use of alternative means of accessing land for public purposes provides clues to achieve that elusive middle ground between all stakeholders

There is now global evidence that it is cities and their immediate regions that drive economic growth. This report studies the Delhi National Capital Region (NCR), which accommodates India’s foremost economic agglomeration, through an economic geography lens that closely synergizes with urban and regional planning and governance.