Rehabilitation of Lyari river, Karachi

This thesis demonstrates the rehabilitation of Lyari River, from a vantage point of the historical and regional development of mega city Karachi. Its growth patterns and important events after the partition of sub-continent in 1947 till the present day. Karachi has grown into many folds after the partition mainly because of its mass migration of refugees coming from India and also Karachi being the only sea port of Pakistan. Many refugees settled along the Lyari river through the informal settlement. With the time these informal settlement started to expand, not only along the Lyari river but also on the river banks. This process of expansion created lot of illegal encroachment of resources. Lack of governances built up poor infrastructure with lot of garbage storages on the banks of Lyari river. To stop the encroachment and to improve the transportation system of mega city they planned a Lyari Expressway, which is being criticized by the experts to be not a concrete solution to the transportation problem in mega city of Karachi. It requires a mass transit system or the revival of Karachi circular railway for such improvement. Karachi city also need to solve this issue of informal settlement but better housing system, where people can get better quality of environment and infrastructure to uplift their living standards. The research is based on these issues regarding the rehabilitation of Lyari river in Karachi, environment of the river and how it can benefit on bigger city scale. Such a case study of Indore city in India is being used to understand the impact and outcome of results. The design solution is an exploration of the many possibilities that could be implement on the rehabilitation of Lyari river.