Track2Realty Exclusive: Prayag Damodar returned to the home town Ahmedabad after having spent 14 long years in the Gulf region where the only option of living has been high rises and skyscrapers. He had developed the liking for such vertical living so much that he had a feeling of missing that sky high living back home as the prevailing housing culture has been standalone residential units when he left the city.
Even though a few apartments have come up by then, still the norm has been the low rise and mid rise construction as the residents of Gujarat were rather uncomfortable with the sky high apartments by then. More importantly, the earthquake in 2001 also made many of the residents across the state to feel safe in a plotted residential living.
“I don’t feel I have come back to the same old Ahmedabad. These swank and comfortable apartments are as good as any other city across the world. Ahmedabad indeed has changed in all these years and it is reflective in the way high rises are being preferred over even the villas. Unlike some other metros, land availability is not an issue here but I feel affordability is the primary reasons for vertical growth of this city resulting in mushrooming of high rise apartments. More importantly, the residents of the city also seem to have realised the need to decongest the city and hence these apartments have an overwhelming patronage. The very concept of living and liking for an apartment has changed,” says Damodar.
The take of this NRI may seem to be over projection of high rises in Ahmedabad real estate market as of now. Analysts, on the contrary, seem to be in agreement with this NRI. They point out that the growth of property market across the state over the last over two decades has not been uniform and the major cities like Ahmedabad, Vadodara and Surat are showing signs of metro cities. They suggest in these cities only way to go forward is vertical since the horizontal growth of the city cannot be sustained anymore due to infrastructure bottlenecks as well as other civic issues.
Facts speak for themselves. However, the sprouting high rise apartment complexes that line the city surprised him completely. Today, Ahmedabad alone has 24 upcoming sky high buildings with the height of 70 meters (230 feet) and above and the highest building Gift Diamond Tower is 410 meters (1345 feet) with 86 floors. This is phenomenal keeping in mind the fact that Ahmedabad till 2011 had only one building, Patang Hotel with a height of 67 meter (210 feet) and Gift One at 122 meter (400 feet) has been the tallest building till 2012.
A real estate developer who does not wish to be quoted asserts that in terms of the prevailing apartment culture in Gujarat high rises are clearly the winner. According to him, the quest is for skyscraper mostly because of the view. With the new changes in GDCR it is very likely that Gujarat may emerge as the destination skyscraper in future. Also BRTS, Metro, excellent city road planning makes cities like Ahmedabad, Vadodara and Surat likely to be cities of skyscrapers in near future.
“I don’t think plotted developments are getting extinct in these cities but clearly it is going to be very difficult to sell plots. Vertical buildings are the way forward, if not due to shortage of land then due to shortage of municipal facilities in periphery locations that leads to high rise. After expansion of municipal limits in Ahmedabad not all facilities have been provided across all areas of city. This leads to people agreeing to pay a premium in the developed parts of the city,” says the developer.
Amit Oberoi, National Director, Valuation & Advisory Services and Research with Colliers International, however, has a different take when he says that most consumers would ideally prefer plotted developments and to own their own land, especially after the earthquake in 2001. But in cities like Surat and Ahmedabad there is limitation of land availability and hence in these cities developments are mostly mid to high rise apartments. In Vadodara, apartments are mostly mid-rise.
“The allowed FSI is low and hence it may not be possible for these cities to emerge as the destination skyscraper. Moreover, people still prefer plotted developments, if there is availability. However, in larger towns plotted developments are located on the outskirts and these areas are generally perceived to be far from employment centers so there are few takers,” says Oberoi.
A section of analysts believe the quest for sky rises is also because of the economy of the scale nowadays. Land prices across the major markets of Gujarat have seen a steep increase in recent times, a far greater appreciation than residential built up capital values. This is making many projects economically not viable to develop. There is a shortage of land, which is compounded by shortage of economically viable developable land.
The only way forward for the major cities of Gujarat is to grow vertically. The encouraging fact is that these cities are fast showing the growth trends of any other metropolitan city and hence it is but natural that high rises are increasingly being adopted as the common practice than exception. Developers active in this market rather point out that Gujarat has the potential to grow as the city of not just high rises but truly skyscraper if the migration as a fall out of employment prospects keeps maintaining the same pace and momentum. Since, Gujarat does not have the luxury of more planned satellite townships or development plan for peripheral areas the city has no other option but to grow vertically.
In conclusion, it may be premature to say that Gujarat has come up on the list of cities with apartments touching the skylines. Of course, the signs are very positive keeping in mind the developments in Ahmedabad. Other than that, most of the major cities of Gujarat do not figure anywhere in the list of tallest buildings of India as of now. The only visible trend in the city has been the fact that there is change in the luxury consciousness of the buyers in the city. Instead of opting for villas the new age buyers prefer skyscrapers in the major cities with all the lifestyle options integrated with the residential project. They are the buyers who are exposed to global luxury living and expect the same in the city as well.
As a result of buyers’ change of taste and aspirations, there is a visible change in the way residential projects are being planned nowadays. Not only the height of the projects is getting increased, the new projects that are being launched are increasingly getting taller with add-on features. This is helping Gujarat developers to scale up on the high rises and if taken as a trend, it definitely shows the way forward and if the momentum continues Gujarat may soon be on the list of cities that boast of scaling up to live close to the moon. What can be vouchsafed at this point of time is that if conscious efforts are taken by both the developers and the government authorities then skyscrapers are definitely going to find a new destination in Gujarat.
From a corporate standpoint it also makes the feasibility of what the young professionals nowadays desire the most—walk-to-work. The vertical expansion thus also holds promise for the urban centres of the state to strengthen their claim as among the best corporate destinations in the country. So, Ahmedabad, Surat and Vadodara have all the necessary market dynamics that lead a city to emerge as the city of skyscrapers.
