Mumbai | Partnership for Research on Informal and Shared Mobility

Mumbai Living Lab is examining the shared autorickshaw transport ecosystem in the Mumbai Metropolitan Region (MMR), focusing on Nalasopara (E) as the study area and unraveling the linkages between mobility, informality, and livelihoods

About Mumbai Living Lab

This Living Lab is examining the shared autorickshaw transport ecosystem in the Mumbai Metropolitan Region (MMR), focusing on Nalasopara (E) as the study area and unraveling the linkages between mobility, informality, and livelihoods. The shared autorickshaw, a popular form of last-mile connectivity, is a self-organised system with diverse stakeholders from state and non-state actors, unions, residents, and political parties participating in operating and managing this system. Our living lab reveals how these self-organised last-mile connectivities develop their systems of trips, routes, and stops that cater to the neighborhood's inhabitants while exploring the political economy dynamics among all these stakeholders.

We adopt a method of forming a Living Lab, comprising local NGOs, community-based organizations, and driver unions, as a platform for building and exchange of information. In this case, the KRVIA (Kamla Raheja Vidhyanidhi Institute of Architecture) which is our academic partner provides the knowledge building and dissemination platform. The final objective of the Living Lab is to create a sustainable system of shared mobility that can advocate for its recognition as a form of public transport and positively affect the livelihood of the drivers, vendors, and users in Nalasopara. This model might then be replicated in all the station areas of Vasai Virar Municipal Corporation and also the other municipalities of the MMR for greater impact in the region..

Nalasopara is in Vasai Virar Municipal Corporation, which is located in the the periphery of MMR. It is one of the fastest-growing peripheries in this region. The working-class migrants seeking affordable living conditions have moved to these peripheries and take advantage of the arteries of the local train network that connects the region to the work centres in Mumbai city. While some part of Nalasopara has housing that are built by private developers and builders, the eastern part along the National Highway, where there are a large number of industries there are residents who engaged in the art of self-organizing, not just homes but an entire ecosystem of transportation, livelihoods, and infrastructure that accommodats the needs of the migrant working-class. The local train stations in the peripheral regions form these nodes from where the last mile connectivity is offered by shared autorickshaws. Along with these autorickshaw boarding points are informal vending markets that form a complex ecosystem serving the people returning from work.

As stated earlier the Living Lab, acting as platform for engagement with the community and their participation in the process of research and documentation. This also formed the basis to identify the issues and challenges faced by different stakeholders on the ground. The study employs mapping of the whole ecosystem and analyzing how this form of shared mobility impacts all the stakeholders primarily drivers, vendors, and users of this mobility system.

It also identifies unserved neighborhoods and vulnerable stakeholders who find it challenging to be part of this mobility system. We would be employing the following forms of method for mapping the ecosystem.

Trip Mapping – This would help in identifying the routes, the trips and frequencies of the shared mobilty system.

Neighbourhood Mapping – This would select vulnerable neighborhoods to understand the inhabitants' participation in providing this form of shared mobility in the form of drivers or vendors. It will also help us understand the other forms of livelihood and their links to mobility.

User Mapping – It will work with a sample set of users comprising of workers, youth, women, children, and the elderly to understand the nature of their activities and movement patterns throughout the day.

Stakeholder Mapping – This will map all the stakeholders, their interests, their synergies, and their conflict with each other. This will help us construct the political economy of this phenomena.

Labour Assessment Mapping – It will explore the incomes, the expenditures, and the ability of the drivers and vendors to secure their financial futures.

Society for the Promotion of Area Resource Centers (SPARC) with its aim to establish a Living Lab for holistic engagement in informal and shared mobility would be working along with on-ground NGO partner Youth for Unity and Voluntary Action (YUVA).

Youth for Unity and Voluntary Action (YUVA) is a non-profit development organisation committed to enabling vulnerable groups to access their rights and have been instrumental in working with many neighbourhoods in Nalasopara with their climate action project.

For academic dissemination and research scholars, we are partnering with Kamla Raheja Vidhyanidhi Institute of Architecture (KRVIA). The institute has been imparting quality education in the field of Architecture under the aegis of the University of Mumbai for the last thirty years and Urban Design and Urban Conservation for the last sixteen years.

SPARCs platform on LinkedIn, Twitter and Instagram forms the mode of outreach in social media. In the last two months, we have been able to produce observations on peripheral development and informal shared mobility in the region. Additionally, we have employed digital ethnography where we developed a short film titled "The Walk" which highlighted the relation between the station premises, the vending areas and the shared auto rickshaw.

This form of visual documentation was then taken ahead by architecture students from KRVIA (academic partner), who developed five short films focusing on informal shared mobility through various themes.