City profile: Shimla

a r t i c l e i n f o Shimla is one of the 80 hill stations which were established on preferred locations during British rule in India. It is the summer capital of pre-independent India, planned and developed for a maximum population of 25,000 in a picturesque hill setting. Presently, Shimla is capital of the state of Himachal Pradesh, one of the most preferred tourist destinations in the country and the most important administrative and educational center in the region. It houses a population of 169,000, as per 2011 census, which is much more than its planned capacity. As a result, to meet the demand of residential, commercial, educational, work and recreational facilities for this ever increasing population; Shimla once famous for its natural settings, beautiful buildings and marvelous townscape; has undergone tremendous change and has numerous issues and problems of development. It is one of the very few examples of tremendous urban development in environmentally sensitive and picturesque hill settings. An attempt is made to understand the context of development in Shimla, by highlighting the pattern of development along with different planning interventions made to achieve regulated development in the form of development plans, land-use plan/s and building regulations. 1. Overview of development in hill stations During British rule (from 1750s to 1947), 80 hill stations were established on preferred locations in India to act as summer retreats and resorts and to protect the British personnel from the harsh sun of the plain regions. These hill stations in India were developed in the picturesque settings and cool climates which can be classified into four regions depending upon their location as northern hill stations e. Different locations prior to their development as hill stations were either small hamlets or remained undis-covered in the hinterlands, where people and material has to be transported up through steep and difficult terrain. Mitchell has also proposed the following five categories of station, as the official multifunc-tional hill station, the private multi-functional hill station, the single-purpose hill station, the minor hill station, and the satellite hill station (Kennedy, 1996; Mitchell, 1972). Major constraints for development in hill stations at that time were insufficient accessibility, fragile ecology and high seismic vulnerability, absence of any infrastructure, acute availability of construction materials and skilled workmanship and adverse climatic conditions. In spite of all these constraints, hill stations developed during the pre-independence period are unique examples …