Despite an Ideal location, good industrial base and a large educated workforce, making Karachi a sustainable city is still a distant dream because of the lack of vision and commitment withour successive governments, said Pasban Democratic Party (PDP) Chairman Altaf Shakoor here Sunday.
He said that the UN Sustainable Development Goal 11 defines sustainable cities as those that are dedicated to achieving green sustainability, social sustainability and economic sustainability.
They are committed to doing so by enabling opportunities for all through a design focused oninclusivity, as well as, maintaining a sustainable economic growth. He said presently Karachi is considered amongst the most polluted cities of the region. It lacks efficient and environment friendly public transport, green architecture, urban farming, renewable energy sources, and proper water conservation and waste management.
He said without meeting these five important goals we can’t make Karachi a sustainable or eco-city.He said in terms of public transport, Karachi is the worst megacity of the world. Not talking about eco-friendly public transport, it even lacks a respectable conventional commuting system. Even the decades old surface rail commuting system, Karachi Circular Railway (KCR) is dysfunctional. The city still depends on rickshaws and Chingchies. The Green Line bus rapid transit (BRT) system could not yet be fully completed. Orange Line BRT is totally ill-planned as useless till effectively extending it to the city centre, preferably to the Keamari port area.
