Urbanization worldwide is increasingly faced with environmental crises, water-related crises like flooding, water shortage, and ecosystem deterioration. Blue-Green Infrastructure (BGI), especially in the guise of water-sensitive urban design (WSUD), is a reaction that weaves urban development and ecological function together. This paper examines the development of water-sensitive urban design in cities and its location near water edges, highlighting the cultural mythology and historical importance behind such spaces. Using global and Indian case studies—such as historic cities of Varanasi and Ujjain—the paper shows how historically resilient urban forms coincided with water-sensitive principles centuries before the term became fashionable. The article further discusses how reviving mythologically and culturally charged water-edge urbanism can inform sustainable infrastructure in cities today.
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Introduction
Urbanization is the hallmark of the 21st century, with cities becoming the main living spaces for humankind. Yet, this rapid growth is often at a cost—impervious surfaces, altered water cycles, and for sighted ecological memory. Blue-Green Infrastructure (BGI) presents a way to resilience through the integration of natural processes (blue: water; green: plants) and the built environment. Especially, water-sensitive urban design (WSUD) works against these problems by harmonizing urban elements with hydrological regimes.
Yet, the idea of aligning cities with water is not new. Historically, cities developed along rivers, lakes, and coastlines, where water was not just a resource but also a sacred and cultural entity. This article proposes that understanding the historical and mythological significance of water edges in urbanism can enhance the effectiveness and cultural appropriateness of WSUD in contemporary cities.
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Understanding Blue-Green Infrastructure and Water-Sensitive Urban Design
2.1 Definitions and Principles
Blue-Green Infrastructure (BGI) is a system of natural and semi-natural sites that are planned to sustainably manage water while providing environmental and social advantages. These include:
- Rain gardens
- Bioswales
- Permeable pavements
- Urban wetlands
- Riparian buffers
- Green roofs and facades
Water-sensitive urban design (WSUD), a component of BGI, focuses on:
- Integrated management of the water cycle
- Reducing impervious surfaces
- Harvesting and storing stormwater
- Improving biodiversity and aesthetics
2.2 Current Relevance in Urban Planning
With climate change, flooding, and urban heat islands, infrastructure in cities should be adaptive as well as ecologically functional. WSUD facilitates:
- Mitigating urban flood risks
- Groundwater recharging
- Water quality improvement
- Forming cooling microclimates
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Historic Urbanism and the Mythology of Water Edges
3.1 Rivers as Origins of Civilizations
Historically, cities developed along rivers—Mesopotamia (Tigris-Euphrates), Harappa (Indus), and Egypt (Nile). In India, holy cities such as Varanasi, Haridwar, and Ujjain developed around rivers not just for survival but for religious reasons.
3.2 Water and Mythology in India
In Indian cosmology, rivers are sacred beings—Ganga a goddess, Yamuna with Krishna, Shipra with Mahakaleshwar. Water shores were ritual grounds:
- Ghats: Border areas between land and water, facilitating rituals, trade, and social life.
- Stepwells (Baolis): Combining water storage with architectural elegance and social congregation.
They reflect modern WSUD in combining culture, functionality, and environment.
3.3 Ancient City Examples
Varanasi: Evolved with stepped ghats along river hydrology. Natural allowance for seasonal changes in Ganga’s flow.
Ujjain: Temple-city plan was influenced by Shipra River’s flow. Celestial alignments around water were the basis for the mythology of Kumbh Mela.
Hampi: Stepped water features, canals, and sacred tanks expressed a water-conscious civilization.
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Traditional Wisdom as Antecedent to WSUD
4.1 Rainwater Collection and Sacred Groves
Rajasthan’s cities of Jodhpur and Jaipur had rainwater collection through kunds, johads, and talaabs, placed strategically with catchment reasoning. Temples frequently featured water tanks that served as ecological sponges as well.
4.2 Urban Morphology and Water Flow
In South Indian towns such as Madurai or Kanchipuram, urban planning was governed by temple tanks, which were focal water-retention basins. Roads extended from these water bodies, enabling the management of surface runoff.
They were decentralized, robust, and culturally rooted—fundamental tenets now reiterated in WSUD.
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Modern Water-Sensitive Design at Urban Fringes
5.1 Rain Gardens and Urban Wetlands
Rain gardens utilize indigenous plants to infiltrate stormwater. In cities such as Portland (USA) and Melbourne (Australia), they are mainstream in streetscapes.
Urban wetlands such as the Cheonggyecheon stream restoration in Seoul or East Kolkata Wetlands in India treat stormwater while providing recreational and ecological spaces.
5.2 Revitalizing Edges through WSUD
Projects such as:
- Sabarmati Riverfront Development, Ahmedabad (highly engineered but with edge promenades and some WSUD features),
- Yamuna Biodiversity Park, Delhi,
- Lakeside development in Udaipur
- try to reconcile urban life with aquatic ecologies.
5.3 Blue-Green Infrastructure in Indian Cities
- Bengaluru’s lakes: Once interconnected tanks forming urban hydrology. Revival attempts now include WSUD elements like constructed wetlands.
- Chennai’s eco-restoration of Adyar River: Incorporates floodplain zoning, native planting, and public access.
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Integrating Mythology into Water-Sensitive Urban Design
6.1 Cultural Mapping for Design
Water edges are not just ecological boundaries—they are ritual landscapes. Mythologically significant sites can be used to:
- Design interpretive WSUD spaces (bioswales in ghats)
- Revitalize sacred tanks as public wetlands.
- Develop rain gardens using culturally relevant plant life (Tulsi, Lotus)
6.2 Resilient Futures Through Sacred Waters
Urban resilience may gain from mythology as a cultural driver. For example:
- Kumbh Mela infrastructure is temporally responsive and is in harmony with flood cycles.
- WSUD-friendly platforms may be introduced in festivals like Ganesh Visarjan or Chhath Puja.
- Conflict may be replaced by cultural practices choreographed with ecological infrastructure.
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Challenges and Recommendations
7.1 Challenges
- Institutional fragmentation
- Land-use conflicts.
- Lack of interdisciplinary planning
- Disconnect between engineers, ecologists, and cultural historians.
7.2 Recommendations
- Involving cultural landscape experts in WSUD projects
- Employ Participatory Urbanism for community-driven edge restoration.
- Encourage decentralized BGI networks.
- Make digital mapping of historic water systems part of city planning.
Water-sensitive urban design is the key to resilient, ecological, and equitable cities. But its success in the Indian context—and other historically rich urban textures—rests on an understanding of the cultural and mythological ethos of water edges. Cities such as Varanasi, Ujjain, and Madurai demonstrate that integration of water and urban life has been historically deep. Future city infrastructure needs to not only take in stormwater or provide aesthetic wetlands but also reimagine mythic waterscapes as living blue-green corridors. By respecting these legacies, cities can design meaningful, inclusive, and ecologically rich futures.
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