Physical Density and Urban Sprawl: A Case of Dhaka City - KTH

qualities and physical densities are standard but 18% of total population live in informal
settlements. Uttara has been built as the satellite town of Dhaka city to provide houses to the
middle and higher middle income people. Here also 19% of total population live in informal
settlements. Actually each and every thana of Dhaka city is holding informal settlements.
3.9.3 Owner ship pattern of informal settlements
With reference to table 3.7 it is evident that most of the informal settlements (77.15%) are
located in the private land but the ownership is different. Sometimes the owner is single or
sometimes multiple. The reason behind this is, a lot of vacant lands have been illegally
occupied by some powerful politicians or people. They build informal houses to earn ‘‘black
money’’ by renting the houses as well as conducting illegal businesses like drug and sex
businesses. The second major percentage (21.42%) is located on the government land but
they are also being conducted by the powerful politicians in that area.
Table 3. 7: Owner ship pattern of land
Owners Number of settlements Percentage
Government 644 21.42
Non government organization 35 1.16
Private (single owner) 1270 42.23
Private (Multiple owner) 1047 34.82
Others 11 0.36
Total 3007 100
Source: LGED, 1996.
Although it is difficult to relate the characteristics of emerging block types with only a few
factors, it seems however, that rapid urbanization trends play a major influential role
especially on the proliferation of formal and informal settlements in Dhaka city. This factor is
linked to the housing and land supply system. Government land and housing supply
organizations provide block with standard physical densities and spatial qualities but the
private sectors provide houses with high physical densities to increase efficiency of spaces
inside the block. The informal housing settlements are mainly developed in the periphery of
the city, though these types of housings are available in the inner part of the city. The area of
the city is increasing due to the development of the informal settlements.
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