A UTOPIAN WORLD

Imagine a world where everything was perfect, a world where people never had to suffer, a
world full of peace and harmony. This was the vision of the artist Bodys Isek had for his country.
He designed utopian cities which he one day hoped would be done for his country. Using him as
my inspiration, I decided to design a world of utopian cities, where everything was accessible to
everyone and people would not have to suffer for anything therefore people would not have to
migrate to other places in search for a better livelihood.
Mass migration is a major issue facing the world. This occurs when a large number of people
move from one geographical area to another. The issue of mass migration must be solved , but
before a problem can be solved one must first be able to identify the cause. But for such a broad
issue , the cause cannot be pin pointed to only one thing, because people are different therefore
they would migrate for different reasons, some may be because of job employment , terrorist
attacks and for better living conditions. But from the research conducted we can see that majority
of the world populace either migrate because of draught , floods or food scarcity and for the
cause of all these issues can be pin pointed to one thing and that is Climate Change. Therefore to
solve the issue of mass migration I have decided to design a utopian city which would be eco
friendly and be able to carter for the needs of the people which would thereby lead to the
reduction of migration in the world.
As stated in Michael Brawne’s book ‘the design process and the expected eye’, Charles Eames
defined design as “A plan for arranging elements in such a way as to best accomplish a particular
purpose”, also stated in his book was that this definition meant that when one was designing one
should be able to forecast a future event ,or should design for the future. Taking this into
consideration, I have decided to design a world filled with Utopian cities, that is taking the
countries in the world as cities and designing them in such a way that every issue is taken care
of.
It would be impossible to say that I would be solving the whole world’s migration problem at
once, after all Rome was not built in a day. In order to tackle the issue of mass migration, I
would have to start by solving a smaller issue of rural urban migration. That is the movement of
people from the rural areas to the urban areas. By solving the problem of one village at a time ,
slowly but surely I would be able to solve the issue of mass migration. The site I have chosen to
begin with is a town in Ghana called Keta.
Keta is coastal town in the Volta Region of Ghana. It is the capital of the Keta Municipal
District. Keta is the sixty-first most populous settlement in Ghana in terms of population, with a
population of 23,207. Parts of the town were devastated by sea erosion between the 1960s and
1980s. In the year 2018 over 5000 people in Keta were rendered homeless due to floods caused
by an overflow of the Keta lagoon. Because of this many people were forced to migrate to other
places in search for better livelihood.
In order to solve the flood issue in Keta and also to reduce the rate of migration , I have decided
to make Keta a Utopia city , on a sense that , people would not be tempted to migrate from their
homes for reason. In order to achieve this , I would start by making Keta a sponge city , that is
when the floods do comes the ground would be able to soak the water , leaving it dry, and also I
would create channels in the ground that when the water is soaked in the ground the would be
directed to the green houses that I would provide in the city layout. The city layout is going to be
planned using the Central Business District method, this is by making the center of the city the
business district while the surroundings would be residential, recreational and agricultural areas.
I would also introduce the creating of houses on water. so that even as the floods do grow the
houses would still be there, for those close to the lake.
The new city of Keta would be powered by renewable energy sources such as solar and wind,
and other measures would be taken in order to reduce the carbon footprint of the town, in order
to reduce the impact on Climate change. Keta would also have hospitals ,schools and other
facilities that would help improve the livelihood of the people, so as to reduce the rate of
migration. Green houses would be provided to carter for food in the city, these green houses
would also create job opportunities for the people in the town, and the would be provided with
water which was collected from the floods. Water recycling methods would be introduced to the
city in order to reduce the rate of water wastage.
In conclusion my new design for Keta would be considered a utopian city , because everything
would be provided and that would encourage people to stay instead of migrating.