This session of SOCIAL will feature a lightning talk by Apoorva Rathod of the University of New Brunswick, followed by a main talk by Govind Gopakumar of Concordia University
Lightning talk: I took the Metro, now what? Exploring last mile connectivity from a gendered perspective in Delhi, India.
Large investments in mass transit systems such as the Metro has become ubiquitous in Indian urban policy and planning. While critical studies on the metro from environmental, economic and sociopolitical ecology perspectives abound, there is little attention paid to the (lack of) infrastructure investments connecting metro systems with other modes of transportation. In this talk, Apoorva Rathod discusses the last mile connectivity – the transport modes that connect metro systems with final destinations such as homes or workplaces – from a gendered perspective. She highlights the contrast between the metro station and the streets just outside to show how, despite the promises of the metro in being a “social leveler” and the apparent addressing of gendered concerns such as through heavily guarded metro stations, the metro privileges certain groups while furthering accessibility for others
Main talk: Going BUST? Style of Infrastructuring and Urban Mobility Transformations in India
With a stated policy goal of India joining the ranks of economically advanced nations by 2047, the momentum to develop economically have been particularly acute in recent times. In its wake, the question of environmental sustainability is more than ever refracted through the lens of economic development. Environmental sustainability in this situation rehearses solutionisms that remain tethered to the predominant extract-dump modalities of environment-society relations unleashed by a modernizing developmental pathway. Case in point is the effort to transition to low-carbon mobility in Indian metropolises. Given the intensity of fossil fuel consumption spurred by locked-in processes of urban mobility, infrastructure interventions to fix motorization and minimize carbon appear as necessary solutions. One such mode of solutionism is the reliance on metro systems that are ubiquitous in the Indian urban landscape. Metro systems are justified as extending comfortable and quick options for commuters thus attracting the office-goer away from their personal vehicles. Despite the palpable promise to de-motorize cities, metro systems contain contradictions that question their ability to stem the growing tide of automobiles. Bringing a Science and Technology Studies (STS) perspective allows us to inquire into this vexed situation and what it portends for our reliance on technologies to address a relentlessly persistent urban challenge. Govind Gopakumar proposes a particular style of infrastructuring – going BUST (Big Urban Science and Technology) – identified with the deployment of metro systems in Indian cities. Through empirical engagement, he posits that the style of infrastructuring could be understood as going ‘big’ that is not merely a matter of scale and size alone but also a matter of control, of hubris, of disconnection, and of power. In the process, it is the deployment of bigness that becomes the end in metro systems in urban India rather than any form of de-automobilization.
This event will run from 9 -10 a.m. EST and 7.30–8.30 p.m. IST
*Please note: this is on online event. Zoom details will be sent out closer to the session*
About the speakers
Govind Gopakumar is currently Professor and Chair of the Centre for Engineering in Society at Concordia University. He is also a co-director of the Mobile, Secure, and Sharing Cities cluster at the Next Generation Cities Institute at Concordia University. Govind’s work is located at the intersection of interdisciplinary fields of scholarship of science and technology studies, and urban environmental studies. The current focus of his research is on understanding the underlying politics of the growing predominance of private automobiles around the world as a means of moving around in cities and its implications for sustainable and inclusive cities. Govind received his doctoral degree in Science and Technology Studies from Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute, New York. He recently published Installing Automobility with MIT Press. He is currently developing two strands of research – on the politics of embedding automobility in the global South and the politics of transition to sustainable modes of mobility in global megacities. His research has been supported by SSHRC, FQRSC, SICI, Volt-Age, etc.
Apoorva Rathod (she/her) is a Postdoctoral Fellow at the Community Transportation Research Lab, University of New Brunswick, Fredericton. She holds a PhD in Human Geography from the University of Gothenburg, Sweden. Her work seeks to combine social science perspectives with engineering approaches in transportation and mobility studies, such as looking at the effects of transportation planning and policy on vulnerable populations, planning environmentally and socially sustainable transport, and using participatory approaches in transportation studies. She is currently part of a project studying infrastructure planning in small to medium-sized cities across Canada. Her research has been supported by SSHRC and Housing, Infrastructure and Communities Canada.
