Planning & Infrastucture
Bus Station, Janmarg BRTS – Meghal Arya
Continuity between the public disciplines of architecture is a broken line—a take that varies from outright radical to the plain mundane. Sifting through the layers of history and crossovers of interpersonal roads, this piece of architecture holds a relevance to the emergence of Ahmedabad, India. Ahmedabad BRTS named Janmarg – the path for the people, is a controlled transport strategy covering a network of 155kms. It delineates a median lane as a strategic intervention for free movement of the transit system flanked by vehicular roads. Interrupting its dedicated corridors, the BRTS Bus Station arrives as an identifiable element to this growth. The typology for the Ahmedabad BRTS with CEPT University as consultant and Ahmedabad Municipal Corporation as client is placed at every 700m displaying a refreshingly honest and practical approach to everyday life.
Despite the neutrality of the material and rectilinear forms, it exhibits a thought towards architecture responding to its location and differentiating from its city contemporaries. Extending the range of vision and versatility, the 174sqm typology was developed as a studious element of three types of structures. It was a process of several iterations and models.
The interesting facet to this design is the intuitive exploration of the architects. As they put it, “This initiation was a great learning process. We understood the hitches that we would encounter in the construction, made it open to government officials at all levels to express their opinions, invited the people of the city to come and have their say, and finally even the chief minister to give his approval. It was the most public scrutiny for an architect. We observed that at the level of people, their negotiation of it, there were almost no problems. That gave us the confidence of continuing with modifications that were required to ease construction and to make adjustments to local situations.” The primal structure was a fabrication of steel. The intent being a quick assembly composed out of manufactured components. The second typology was garnered as a more thoughtful response to the uncertain ridership in undeveloped areas. The motive delved in the scalability and light weight structures were installed with galavalium iron roofings. The quality alone merited good attention but to create beyond this sector of design involved consideration of materialistic underlyings of leaking roofings and bad workmanship. These nuances revealed an important design facet with a RCC structure ultimately taking shape as a major prototype. The site variations that emerged balanced complemented and confronted the influence of alternative detailing further on.
Confidently positioned in the trafficated city, it has departed from the petty commercialisation in the generic culture of state transport. The bus station imbibes the users’ reaction as the interface for design, introducing people to a new wave of momentum. The bus stations are the median type where buses dock on both sides. Most of them are designed to dock two buses on each side, with off board ticketing and barrier free access. Adapting deviant modifications, the architects eased into a new advertisement policy. The requirements have been met with simple bands at points of focus.
The flexible logic of concrete forms a space of accessibility and comfort. Announcing the entrance, triangulated pillars rise up as signage spaces amidst an elevated green swatch. A ramp with initiates the lead up to the elevated platform. Compounding on the boxy appeal, the interior pushes an external perspective to its limits. The solidity is punctured in long voids threaded by tensile rods. The flow thereon reacts naturally to the movement and position of users. Carefully placed openings sync in with the bus doors- a technology-led activity. Visually, the construct covers a small footprint across the width. Stabilising the precision of equal distance, stainless steel cables negotiate both the need for enclosure and transparency. Light slants in the through the steel slats. Beyond steel, the place boasts of a plantation wooden edge; a warmer material, entirely reciprocating human comfort and aesthetically relevant. Wooden cylinders play on a dramatic vertical band of colour & engagement, perpendicular to seating of the same material. The wooden cylinders string an appealing pattern—identifiable as the brand identity of the system. The Riverwash granite flooring is complemented by a texture, giving the fitout a tactile finish. The picture evolves as a multiplicity of images within a limited tonal range. The volume pieces together “earlier explorations of floating slab and dynamic form in the Jindal bus shelter, but in a more pragmatic sense, also concerns of vandalism, safety and security, equitable access (ramps and tactile flooring), ease of movement and climate”, say the architects. The aesthetic overlaps nearby street furniture wherein a seating has been designed in concrete from L-shaped stands. The design overall extends the notion of a bus-stand. “ The process of BRTS”, Meghal Arya says, “ was continuously evolving. It was very closely connected to the behaviour and reactions of the people— as a “People’s system”. As Charles Eames has stated, “…the details are not details – they make the product”, the architects have elaborated on to know how humans function when furnishing the experience of the interiors. The aura is impulsive—transitional yet symbolic for people to gather.
Project | Bus station, Janmarg BRTS |
|---|---|
Location: | Ahmedabad |
Consultants: | CRDU, Cept, Ahmedabad & Arya Architects, Planning inputs from BRTS |
planning team headed by Prof | Shivanad Swamy |
Design team: | Vijay Arya- Principal Architect Meghal Arya- Architect Urvi Sheth- Architect Dhaval Limbachiya- Architect |
Client | Ahmedabad Municipal Corporation (AMC) |
Project Area: | 80 Stations (174 sqm each) |
Civil & Carpentry Contractors: | Nila Infrastructure, Ahmedabad |
Project Estimate: | Rs. 42 lac per station |
Initiation of Project: | 2008 |
Completion of project | 2010 |
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