Evolution Of The Waterfront Essay

Waterfronts are the edges of water along any urban settlement. People often get attracted towards water and hence the necessity of waterfronts. It is the property of water to reflect, move, change and attract people which captures people’s imagination and provides various opportunities from reaction to business, from being passive to active. Rivers were reason for creation of early human settlements and now they act as an important part of any human settlement. The essay talks about how waterfronts in Indian context have evolved over a period of time from a utilitarian purpose towards gaining a symbolic image for a particular city. It talks about how the design approach created waterfronts and the way in which approach changed over a period of time. Various

Now talking about the rivers which are seasonally and also do not have the religious importance stand neglected as people do not consider them to be divine to intervene along the banks. As we understand the early civilizations (human settlements) preferred to occupy the basins of perennial rivers, seasonal rivers like Sabarmati, Gomti, etc. which flow only after monsoons are the ones which humans have not responded. Also, creating artificial water bodies like step wells, lakes, etc. was much more preferable than responding to the seasonal rivers. As a result waterfront in the medieval eras mainly catered the perennial water bodies. The absence of waterfront for the seasonal fronts started making a point for cities that faced the onslaught of absence of water. The river bed would go dry creating an harsh river bed in middle of the cities with seasonal rivers. This was the period when British overtook the Indian empire. They started responding to the waterfront the way responded in the European manner but tried their best to