Broadly, two development routes exist for improving Chennai. One, we can tinker with improving public service delivery by working on select initiatives for Chennai city. This could marginally impact the living conditions. Any limited success will draw more migrants into Chennai stretching the city’s physical and social infrastructure. The current ‘creeping’ Chennai expansion model is leading to haphazard development patterns. This is likely to lead to lasting long term problems in managing increased citizen aspirations and needs.

The alternate route is to envision the future and plan now for the region around Chennai. This is not a Greater Chennai project. It is a regional development plan around Chennai with a holistic outlook. The region suggested is MAP – Marakonam, Arakonam, Pulicat. If done now, it has the potential to check the growth of Chennai and encourage ‘live and work’ clusters in the region. If done well, this has the power to distribute the future prosperity over a larger geographical area and empower local citizens in the region.

On Dec 18, 2007, CII held a day seminar on “Infra 2007 – MAP tomorrow’s Chennai – Fuelling inclusive growth through holistic regional development”. This was attended by political leaders, administrators, industry and citizen representatives. The idea of MAP was articulated at the inaugural session. This was followed by panel discussions on Foster socio economic development through PPP; Inclusive development for the economically excluded; Infrastructure provisioning through focus on transportation, roads water & power; Governance structure. This note provides the key takeaways from the deliberations. A lot of detailed mapping and work has been done about implementing the idea of MAP. It is hoped the government will constitute a task force to examine the idea of MAP and take the necessary steps to make it a reality.

MAP is regional area based on connecting the ‘nodes’ of Marakkonam, Arakonam, Pulicat and Chennai. This is an area of around 5000 sq kms spread over five districts and encompassing urban and rural areas. Implementing the idea of MAP will require political vision and administrative will. It will require an appropriate governance structure that allows for decentralized jurisdictional authorities to function under a common framework that is aligned for achieving the overarching vision.