Raised Villages
It was in 2005 that Kashef Chowdhury/URBANA started working with the NGO Friendship in various climate action projects. The first of these addressed the plight of migrant population due to climate change in riverine islands or ‘char’ by creating repeatable landforms to house entire villages above the level of yearly floods by simple dig-mound. This was chosen over raising individual houses on stilts because:
+In Bangladesh stilt houses exist only in the hill-tracts where surface run-off in the slopes passes below the houses. But this typology does not exist in fierce flood plains in the delta because of its impracticality in high current settings.
+Any foundation or point load of a stilt will attract whirlpools, consequently sucking out soft silty soil from around the support structure. Many examples of failed structures exist in the rivers because of this reason peculiar to the alluvial delta.
+A foundation that will actually hold in this scenario will be forbiddingly expensive, like piers in a bridge.
+Ladder only access means there is no provision for saving cows and goats when the flood arrives. A cow or a goat is possibly the only asset of a villager in the char and the stilt house solution cannot cater to this basic need.
+A raised house is a risky proposition for the safety of toddlers and babies who constitute majority deaths during floods by accidental falls into the current.
+Floodwaters may not recede for as much as two months and so extended living in the constricted space of a stilt house is not preferable to the dry land of a raised island.
In 2006, when we traveled to these remote locations by a seaplane, one could observe from the plane that most of the naturally occurring river islands appeared to be “comet” shaped. These were so formed because of a leading and a trailing edge, the latter created when passing current deposited silt and with time caused the formation of its characteristic tails. These studies resulted in the design of a teardrop-shaped island, whose forward, flatter end would face the brunt of the incoming flood currents, while the opposite tapering end facilitated quick egress of fast-flowing floodwater. The design was conceived to be materialized through a dig-and-mound approach, so that a ditch dug in the middle provided the earth for the raising of the platform above the level of floods. The central pond thus created could then hold rainwater for use during floods and also be used for fishery during normal times.
The “food-work exchange” program means that villagers were paid to work on their own islands, thus simultaneously creating temporary jobs. The images show the process of digging and creating the central pond, with the excavated earth forming the raised platform itself. The workers seen are the villagers themselves.
There have been design proposals in the country for houses on stilts. But in the floodplains of the delta, unlike the hilly regions of the country, no one has ever chosen such a path due to the inevitable failure of structures in the eddy currents of omnidirectional, fast-flowing floodwaters, on a bed of alluvial soil which can go to depths of 800 feet before hitting rock strata. To say that the people of the floodplains never thought of such a solution of stilt houses, however, is in itself ignorant and arrogant. In a flood setting, individually raised houses with ladders effectively ignore the factor of cattle, which are the only assets of villagers in chars. And so, too, the safety of little children, who have been reported to have fallen into currents when left unattended, not to mention the unhealthy living conditions for a family crammed together under a low roof for days if not weeks on end. The raised platform of the island-like landform provides ample space for cattle, children, and for daily village activity to continue during weeks-long floods.
