Western planners argue that the urban pattern should be the result of “market forces” and of “free choices.” But western public policy and economic subsidies buttress a massive, inefficient urban geometry. Work places are in the City Core and people sleep in dormitory suburbs. Now with the “location-less job” there is chaos with people commuting for work from one suburb to another. Regulations and publicly supported technologies determine the patterns of growth. The subsidies on super highways and expressways alone fix the plans of cities into far flung networks of inefficient infrastructure…. water supply systems which are difficult to maintain, solid waste systems which are unmanageable, roads which can not be repaired, storm drainage systems which do not work, huge losses on power lines and continuous break downs. This entire technology is inappropriate and costly.

Socially this system of spread and sprawl isolates families and reduces their potentials to socialize. It divides the mother from her children; it is economically viable only if both parents work, and a social disaster when the child searches a hidden key to enter his own empty house. The “generation gap” is promoted by a disjointed city.

If subsidies in America, Europe and Japan on the costs of roads, on the price of petroleum, and on the overheads of the automobile industry were removed, the spatial shapes and the physical forms of these countries would transform rapidly toward more human and more equitable “free market” plans. It is indeed public policy that shapes and even perverts the forms of cities and towns. The geometry of equitable, sustainable and “inclusive” communities is a direct result of public policy and planning. If we want to create the city of our dreams, we have to plan that city.

2.5 THE BHUTANESE DREAM

Every society has a dream of what it is…its ideal form. That dream is expressed most precisely in the things a society makes. From simple wooden bowls, traditional woven fabrics, Thangkas, to the national dress, and all of the motifs and components that make up a Bhutanese house… all of these embody the Bhutanese dream. One sees in village houses clustered along the contours, a tradition of community and a tradition of sharing spaces. One sees the placement of small Chortens along the rivers as the rudimentary markers of urban space. One sees in the Dzongs and Monasteries concepts of enclosed spaces, of arcades and of porches. There are traditional gates and gateways; there are Prayer Wheel walls and pavilions. There is a vocabulary of “putting buildings together,” which we can learn from and enhance. Most important there is a spatial tradition of “community” which is rich in its history and in its diversity. It is focused on bringing people together, while respecting their individuality!

As the society grows and matures, as education spreads and the economy becomes more broad based, His Majesty’s Gross National Happiness (GNH) dream will become ever more relevant. That image, that dream of a society that promotes ‘happiness,’ will be most clearly reflected in the shape and in the form of Bhutan’s towns and cities.

The old rural dream of self sufficient farms, of paddy fields and of rural peace will have to be preserved in a thicker weave of cultural, social and spatial life in the fabric of emerging Bhutanese towns and cities. In this new media of making things—things again will have to be made in the Bhutanese Way to sustain a Bhutanese Dream. But this search for the Bhutanese way toward the Bhutanese city will not be an easy one. It will be full of temptations, of wrong possibilities, and of pitfalls.

Traditional Wood Footbridge Provides Sense of Place while Promoting Pedestrian Movement

Section through Dumptse Lhakhang, Heritage Features Unique to Bhutan: Footbridge over the
Wang Chhu