The topographical conditions, concentration of population, environmental assets and geographical features of Gelephu, evoke a need to re-conceptualize the conventional way of planning, which advocates a system of administrative wards, or zones, towards designing and managing urban settlements. There is a crucial need, that the future development envisioned for the town should strongly advocate a balanced urban development within the municipal limit, rather than concentrating facilities and amenities at certain locations. The future development pattern should facilitate the distribution of urban facilities and services equally over the entire town’s landscape, which would also act as development magnets. There should be a hierarchical arrangement of facilities, services, and adequate population concentration towards achieving self-sustainable development strategy.

Considering these factors a system of urban development composed of self-sustainable urban neighborhoods would prove to be an appropriate unit for planning Gelephu. These are called as Urban Villages in the Gelephu Structure Plan with respect to envisioned the morphology of future development. In relative terms an Urban Village / Urban Neighborhood could be compared to traditional village settlements which are essentially self-sustainable communities in terms of their basic needs and requirements.

Conceptually, every Urban Village / Urban Neighborhood identified in the Gelephu Structure Plan will have amenities, basic services and convenience shopping at their centers, called Village Squares, which are surrounded by medium to high density walkup apartments forming the core of the settlement. These are then surrounded with a ring of medium density, and then low density settlements towards the periphery. As a basic unit of planning in the Gelephu Structure Plan, six such Urban Villages have been identified within the Municipal Limits. One of the major determinants in identifying the limits of an Urban Village / Urban Neighborhood, and the location of the Village Square, is the comfortable walking distance of an average human and the proximity of the existing settlement and facilities available within the given location. Thus, the unit of comfortable walking distance becomes the basic scale for defining the boundaries of any proposed Urban Villages / Urban Neighborhoods.

The Village Squares, which form the amenity core of the Urban Village / Urban Neighborhood, essentially would have amenities and facilities for the self-sustainability of the Urban Village / Urban Neighborhood it belongs to. There will be convenience shops, a restaurant cum bar, cafes, barber shop, beauty salon, basic health unit, post-box, minor repair shop for automobiles, a taxi stand, news stand kiosk, neighborhood pub, bakery, cyber café, laundry and other amenities. Apart from these amenities, the Village Squares could also be business centers with office space, laundries, book stores, community halls crèches, ATMs and other ancillary facilities. These Village Squares will be linked with the Urban Hubs through well-established transit corridors and express buses.

The Urban Hubs will cater to the entire town and the region’s population and would have all the facilities of a Village Square and much more! The Urban Hub will be the setting for up-scale shopping in branded stores. In addition, it would have entertainment facilities, such as cinema halls, bowling alleys, restaurants, bars, discos, etc. It would have a space for a town level library, banks, post office, town hall, police station, fire station, banks and hotels as well. In Gelephu, the existing town core located in the south-east part of the municipal boundary is proposed to be upgraded into an Urban Hub, which will cater to most of the needs of the present day.

However, with the new potentials and development policies it would not be long before Gelephu would be a booming city and there would be a need for a second, new Urban Hub. The best location for this future Urban Hub would be just outside the western side of the municipal limit near Aipole Chhu where the existing re-settlement camp is located.

This would take pressure off the existing Town Core over the next three decades, and would support the residential areas nearby. It could also be seen as a potential place where major recreational and educational facilities are developed. The placement of a new college and the proposed National Sports Stadium in this area is the start of such development, which would be gradually build up and would be equipped with the facilities and services as per future needs. This new Urban Hub would be a bit “up-beat” with branded retail, fast food and IT out-lets.

Both, Village Square and Urban Hubs would have residential accommodation of high density. The predominant housing typology would be walkup apartments. A Village Square would cover approximately two hectares of area, while an Urban Hub would cover approximately four hectares.

The Gelephu Structure Plan addresses the issue of lack of identity in modern town and cities, created as a result of present day’s large scale land use development patterns and other similar attitudes of planning, by denoting specific usages, or activities to every Urban Village / Urban Neighborhood, apart from its basic function. This will provide necessary identity to the respective Urban Villages / Urban Neighborhoods at planning level.

Table 5.3 : Characteristics of the Proposed Urban Villages / Urban Neighborhoods within Gelephu Municipal limit  

Table 5.4 : Common Facilities proposed in a Village Squares