New Delhi and Bangalore are two cities in India which carry an image of “Garden City”. Under the British Empire, the development of New Delhi and Bangalore subscribed to a common framework, with a few differences. In whole or in parts, both cities showcase:
1. Grand Manner Planning as a Metaphor- highlighting the dominant class of society- the British
2. Emphasis on siting, massing and architectural character of new buildings
3. Social engineering- insulation of the European class from the native town
4. Insulation of the administration and ruling class by strategic positioning of the army and the cordon sanitaire/ parade grounds, to counter insurgencies with a free line of fire
5. Establishment of civic and commercial districts with easy access
6. Centralizing of services and related uses to achieve a hierarchical land use structure
7. Establishment of hygienic urban conditions for new residential areas
8. Emphasis on urban open spaces as recreation areas
9. Preservation of historic urban elements
10. Creation of streetscape to unify the city visually- use of focal points, roundabouts and tree-lined roads
This framework can be traced back to the City Beautiful Movement in the United States that developed in response to conditions in American cities at the turn of the 20th century. Its idea of city streetscape was inspired by the tree-lined boulevards, public squares and plazas, and neoclassical architecture of European cities. It is here, on the point of tree-lined streets, that Bangalore and New Delhi share another set of similarities and differences.
In his hugely popular book “Trees of Delhi” (2006), Pradip Krishen sheds some light on the “Avenue Trees of the New Capital” about the preference for certain species by Captain George Swinton (Chairman-Town Planning Committee) and Edwin Lutyens (Chief Architect). It seems that the selection of species was concluded on the basis of visual effects such as crown silhouette, mass, shape and canopy height in order to integrate some near and distant vistas of ancient and new architecture. This need for controlled visual experiences apparently left out robust and long-lived evergreens like the banyan from most streets. Many native trees of Delhi, being summer-deciduous, never made the cut in the quest for nearly verdant cityscape, while the ones chosen for their supposed “evergreen nature” and brought in from elsewhere (e.g. moist places) changed their attributes due to the semi-arid climate of Delhi- ‘an elementary ecological miscalculation’ as Pradip Krishen puts it.
Bangalore, at the turn of the century, did not have the same striking vistas of Lutyens’ Delhi. However, being blessed with better climate, groundwater regime and soil, the tree-lined roads of Bangalore responded to the concept of serial blossoming. Advocated by Gustave Krumbeigel, the concept depended on continuous seasonal blossoms and affected the perception of the city in every season. It is likely that Krumbeigel independently derived his species along the same lines of bias as seen at Lutyens’ Delhi, reinforced with his own professional exposure and training in Europe. Here too, some of the most familiar trees favored by its native inhabitants were rejected by Krumbeigel, resulting in a short list of avenue trees for Bangalore, mostly exotic.
