Madhav Raman

  • Organization

    Anagram Architects

  • Position

    Principal

  • Connect


Of the Best Laid Plans

Modern sanitation engineering and urban planning were borne out of the strategies adopted by many of Europe’s great cities to manage their urban crises of the 1800s. Creaking, as they were, under the pressures of overpopulation, epidemics, squalor and riots, most cities underwent a drastic spatial and infrastructure overhaul.

The Great Stink of London in the summer of 1858 led to the creation of its sewer network by Sir Joseph Bazalgette and by 1870 the duo of Baron Hausmann and Eugène Belgrand delivered Paris from its perpetual battle against coups, cholera, and congestion. Primarily involving  retrofitting centralised sewerage and piped water supply to existing quarters, it also involved decongesting precincts and clearing built mass in order to improve light and ventilation and mitigate social unrest.

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