Envisioning river-based urbanism in Bangladesh: a landscape-systems-informed approach for urban settlement pattern within a decolonized river terrain

Abstract

Bangladesh was once a river-based artisan context where the locals co-existed with the ever-shifting land and water. But this transient context was transformed into a static land-based agrarian one, by the land policies during the colonial period. Consequently, inappropriate settlements took over the river terrain and the locals started conceiving natural riverine flood and erosion exclusively as calamities. Colonial river engineering mechanisms appeared to be faulty as they were devoid of awareness of the underlying landscape systems and failed to protect the local population from these riverine calamities. This research intends to find suitable landscape architectural strategies that can dismantle the colonized river domain and alleviate the adverse effects of flooding and land erosion while guiding the urban settlements within the transient river terrain. The Brahmaputra-Jamuna River system has been taken as a case-study site for the research by design. Through site analysis at multiple scales and investigation of native practices, precedent cases, and relevant toolboxes, the research demonstrates design schemes, applying a set of multi-scalar landscape architectural strategies and tactics that can promote resilience for the local settlements to deal with apparently adverse riverine landscape events so that they can be harnessed for the greater good of the community.