Moving Towards Megapolis In Sri Lanka

By S. Sivathasan –December 30, 2015 

S. Sivathasan

From Independence to now, the greatest proposal that is coming about after Mahaweli Development is the Megapolis Project. Half a century intervening between the two is a tragic commentary on the nation’s political order. Still worse has been the unwholesome management of the economy. Reversing the past and setting foot anew on fresh territory is what the proposal is about. In the geographical space it will spread across, about the time it takes to approach a stage of completion and in scale of investment to spark valuable spin off, it is envisaged as a gigantic project.

The concept of a chain of urban areas, interlinked into “City Region” was outlined as a ‘Megalopolis’ in 1915 by Patrick Geddes a Scottish geographer. The scheme envisioned by Hon. Ranil Wickremasinghe in 2002 in his term as Prime Minister, may approximate the concept of a megalopolis in due course. The prominent feature that stood out was the interlinking of cities in the Western Province. This factor may distinguish it from a metropolis.

Speed of Growth

A look around the world may be instructive, even invigorating too. London, the second mega city to develop in the last two millennia grew over a time span of several centuries. Two empires produced Rome and London with an interval of 1800 years. Human ingenuity produced the remaining mega cities in a mere 200 years.

What accounts for this phenomenon of concentration as against spatial dispersal? Rather difficult to explain the contrasting ways, forces acted on a body of people. Centripetally to make them move towards the city or centrifugally to make them move away from. May I state rather blithely that if de-concentration was more viable financially and logistically, humanity would have already made that ideal a reality. There are several disciplines to study this issue comprehensively, but let us survey growth in the past.

Rural – Urban Transition

The world had developed 2 cities by 1800, having a population of more than 1 million. In the 207 years that followed, 468 such cities had grown. UN forecasts that by 2030, cities will be home to 5 billion or 60% of the world’s population. From village to town; rural to urban; town to city; city to megacity and thence to megalopolis is the inexorable transition. There is no letting up. The trend is irreversible.

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