Accessibility

The infrastructure in terms of transportation within Dharavi itself is not the greatest, the roads being too narrow to allow for even the three-wheeled auto rickshaws with which the rest of the city is overrun. However, Dharavi is a station on two of the three train routes that service the city and as such is a great place for working people who need to commute to and from offices across the city.

Dharavi is also the neighbour of the Bandra-Kurla complex (BKC), the latest hub of economy and finance within Mumbai. The two suburbs are separated only by a creek and tangle of mangroves. Indeed Dharavi is at an easily commutable distance from both the business district in South Mumbai and the emerging financial district in the Eastern Suburbs, BKC.

It also close to both the Eastern and Western Express highways, two of the major highways that serve Mumbai’s never ending traffic flow. All these factors make the land that it sits on a veritable gold mine for developers. Innovative residents have in fact begun renting out a portion of their space, or constructing additional stories on their shanties to be rented out.

All of this combines to paint quite a different image from the one that we are all so familiar with when we picture the oft mentioned Dharavi. Perhaps it is time that we rethink our notions of this iconic location in Mumbai.