DATA

The CEO Karnataka recently published the final rolls for Karnataka after finishing their hurried and stressful Special Intensive Revision (SIR). People were asked to prove that they live where they do, and map themselves or their parents/ancestors to the 2002 voter roll. The final roll published now has 4.54 Crore electors in Karnataka as against the 5.54 Cr as per the 2025 Special Summary Review; a reduction of almost one crore electors or 18% of the earlier rolls. However, the numbers in the 28 constituencies in Bengaluru Urban paint a more drastic picture. The 1.026 crore electors as per the…

The Metropolitan Transport Corporation (MTC) serves as the backbone of Chennai's urban mobility, carrying millions of residents every day and accounting for over 70% of the city's public transport share. As the transport utility expands its fleet with new buses and renovates shelters across Greater Chennai Corporation (GCC) limits, evaluating the accessibility of this mode of public transit becomes important, especially around access points near the city’s informal settlements.  To what extent does the MTC bus shelter network provide accessible and adequate service to slum settlements? And, where should improvements be prioritised? That forms the basis of this study, which…

During the Open City biodiversity datajam held in December 2025, our group examined the ecological trends around Bengaluru’s lakes. Our analysis suggests a majority of waterbirds are declining across the city's lakes. Earlier, we addressed crucial questions on how migrant and resident waterbirds are surviving across 14 of Bengaluru’s lakes, how the shape of the lakes influence microhabitats, and how a scoring system can be used to record the decline in lake quality and bird populations. The last of our four-part series turns its attention to an individual site. As part of this study of waterbirds in 14 city lakes,…

While bird detection trends over the years clearly point to the decline of Bengaluru’s shoreline and vegetated-edge habitats, numbers alone tell only part of the story. In Part 3 of this four-part series on the state of the city's waterbirds, we have used a scoring system to understand how stressed the lakes and the microhabitats within the lake are, based on the bird diversity they support. We explore how lake shape, permanent inundation and shifts in citizen-led management might explain why some lakes may thrive as wetlands while others collapse.  For instance, at Kasavanahalli, the Pied Kingfisher and the Coot…

Since Bengaluru’s lakes were formed by damming water flowing down valleys, they are typically wedge-shaped, with a gentle slope and a deep basin towards the embankment. This promotes the growth of diverse vegetation and animals, each adapted to a particular water depth. The result is a natural zonation – reedbeds and shoreline vegetation at the edges, floating and submerged vegetation in the middle, and open water at the deepest end. During the Open City biodiversity datajam held in December 2025, our group examined the ecological trends around Bengaluru’s lakes. In an earlier article, we examined how migrant and resident waterbirds…

Lying at an altitude of 920 metres in the rain-shadow area of the Western Ghats, Bengaluru’s geography and climate do not support a perennial natural water source. Instead, a north-south ridge divides the city into three primary valleys: Hebbal, Koramangala-Challagatta, and Vrishabhavathi. Rainwater draining down these slopes feeds a network of small streams — forming a cascading lake system that the city historically relied on for its water supply. During the Open City biodiversity datajam held in December 2025, our group examined the ecological trends around Bengaluru's lakes. Data on insects, spiders and flora on platforms like iNaturalist were insufficient…

Uppal is a suburb of Hyderabad, located in the northeastern part of the city. It is known for housing landmarks like the Rajiv Gandhi International Cricket Stadium and has schools, government offices, industrial zones and commercial centres. The area experiences high temperatures due to the Urban Heat Island (UHI) effect that operates within the city limits.  Our examination of Land Surface Temperature (LST) data covered the years 2015, 2020, and 2025 and shows how heat zones have expanded with warmer areas becoming larger. In Uppal, rapid urban development has changed the thermal balance. Dense construction and fewer trees  are creating  persistent…

Koramangala is one of Bengaluru’s most recognisable neighbourhoods. Originally planned as a suburb, it witnessed a transformation in the 1990s thanks to its connectivity to Electronic City and the IT corridors along Outer Ring Road. This boom drew skilled professionals from across the country, converting Koramangala into a vibrant commercial hub. With its rapid growth, the question of public transport became even more important, not just for residents, but also for the businesses that thrive here. During OpenCity’s Bengaluru Datajam, organised around the theme of public transport, our group focused on Koramangala’s bus connectivity with the rest of the city.…

Urban biodiversity is often discussed in terms of tree cover, lakes, or flagship species, but far less attention is paid to pollinators—the insects and birds that quietly sustain urban ecosystems. In Bengaluru, a rapidly urbanising city with a strong culture of citizen science, large volumes of biodiversity data are now being generated by the public. But what does this data tell us about pollinators in the city? This article draws from a data jam hosted by OpenCity in Bengaluru that explored pollinator observations using publicly available, citizen-generated datasets. By analysing long-term observation records and spatial data on land use and…

When we discuss urban nature, we often forget about real natural habitats. In Bengaluru, widely called the Garden City, most talks about urban nature focus on landscaped parks, roadside trees, and manicured gardens; in other words, artificial ecosystems designed for looks and human comfort. As lay citizens, we usually notice only such nature as we see around our homes, workplaces or other areas we generally pass by. While these places do have some ecological value, they mostly support a few highly adaptable species. This has strong negative implications for native flora and fauna that depend on open scrublands, grasslands, rocky…