Lord of all it surveys

Even though Chennai is a medium sized city at 176 square km, it is only about one-seventh the area of the 'urban agglomeration' around it. With a population density of about 7000 per sqkm, space needs to be used optimally. And being a city that is close to 400 years old, building and urban development of the city has been subject to more than its share of prevailing fads and fashions.

The latest in the fashion cycle, controlling the development and plans for the city, is the Chennai Metropolitan Development Authority (CMDA), constituted in 1974. Headquartered in this building at Egmore, it reaches out to almost 50 local government authorities (corporations, municipalities panchayat unions and town panchayats). You can imagine the amount of red-tape one needs to unravel to have a construction plan approved or any aspect of the construction validated. Much better to let the builders and property developers do the tape-twisting for us!