From Wikipedia, the free
encyclopedia: Gandhinagar
History
In
1960, the
Indian state of
Bombay was
split into two states —
Maharashtra and Gujarat.
Ahmedabad was selected to be the first capital of Gujarat. It was
proposed that a new capital city be constructed for the state on the
lines of the other two planned cities of India —
Chandigarh and
Bhubaneshwar. Initial plans were to commission the renowned
American architect
Louis Kahn to build the city to rival
Le Corbusier's Chandigarh. But the plans were canceled due to
pressure to make the new city an Indian enterprise.
So the charge of making the new city
was given to Indian architects
H. K. Mewada and
Prakash M. Apte. Both had worked as apprentices during the
construction of Chandigarh. The new city was constructed as per their
plan and was named Gandhinagar after
Mahatma Gandhi, a Gujarati himself. The capital was shifted from
Ahmedabad to Gandhinagar
The new city is spread on the banks of
the Sabarmati river. The main city is designed on the west bank of the
river on 42.9 km² of land. The site is gently sloping, from north-east
to south-west. Gandhinagar comprises thirty sectors. It is a highly
structured city and has a highly ordered street grid - comprising
blocks that are divided by two types of streets, similar to U.S.
avenues and streets. Gandhinagar has "letter roads" (K, KH, G, GH, CH,
CHH & JA) and "number roads" (1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6 & 7). The letter roads
run parallel across the city perpendicular to the number roads. The
number and letter roads intersect each other forming a grid; each
block or square in the grid is given a sector number. Each
intersection is marked by signal names such as CH1, CH2, CH3 or
JA1,JA2.
Geography
and Climate
Gandhinagar is located at
 23.22°
N 72.68° E.[1]
It has an average elevation of 81 metres
(265 feet).
The city sits on the banks of the River Sabarmati, in north-central
Gujarat. It spans an area of 205 km²
(79.15
square miles). The Sabarmati frequently dries up in the summer,
leaving only a small stream of water.
There are three main seasons:
summer, monsoon and winter. Aside from the monsoon season, the climate
is dry. The weather is hot through the months of March to June when
the maximum temperature stays in the range of 36 °C
(97 °F)
and 42 °C
(108 °F),
and the minimum in the range of 19 °C (66 °F) and 27 °C (81 °F). From
November to February, the average maximum temperature is around 29 °C
(85 °F), the average minimum is 14 °C (57 °F), and the climate is
extremely dry. The southwest
monsoon
brings a humid climate from mid-June to mid-September.[2]
Famous
Places
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