The 15-minute city prioritises proximity, but in India, the real urban challenge lies not in access to local amenities, but in unequal access to jobs, quality services, and efficient mobility across the city
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The ‘15-minute city’ concept, popularised by Carlos Moreno and widely adopted in Paris, has rapidly become a dominant narrative in global urban planning discourse. Promoted as a solution to climate change, congestion, and the decline in the quality of urban life, the idea has been widely embraced and rebranded under labels such as “complete communities” and “walkable neighbourhoods.” Yet its growing popularity warrants closer scrutiny, particularly in contexts far removed from the cities where it was first championed.
At its core, the 15-minute city proposes that residents should be able to access essential daily needs such as housing, work, healthcare, education, commerce, and recreation within a short walking or cycling distance. Grounded in the principles of proximity, low-carbon accessibility, and multifunctional land use, Moreno’s vision seeks to foster social cohesion, reduce dependence on private vehicles, and promote healthier, pedestrian-oriented lifestyles.
While Indian cities may resemble 15-minute cities in form, they differ markedly in function. The central challenge lies not in access to amenities, but in access to opportunity, particularly employment, and the deep spatial inequities that shape urban life.
However, when applied to Indian cities, the promise of the 15-minute city becomes more ambiguous. Many Indian neighbourhoods already display the density, compactness, and mixed-use characteristics that the model aspires to create. Daily services are often close at hand, supported by extensive informal economies. Yet this apparent alignment is misleading. While Indian cities may resemble 15-minute cities in form, they differ markedly in function. The central challenge lies not in access to amenities, but in access to opportunity, particularly employment, and the deep spatial inequities that shape urban life.
The critical question, therefore, is not whether Indian cities can be redesigned as 15-minute cities, but whether the concept meaningfully addresses the realities of labour markets, affordability, and inequality that define Indian urbanisation.
The 15-minute city represents a shift away from automobile-centric urban development towards neighbourhood-scale accessibility and a polycentric urban form. Rooted in Moreno’s theory of “chrono-urbanism,” the concept emphasises reducing travel time rather than physical distance, alongside promoting mixed-use neighbourhoods where daily needs are met locally. In the aftermath of the COVID-19 pandemic, the 15-minute city gained prominence as cities sought to reduce long commutes and reinforce local resilience.
Paris has emerged as the flagship example of this approach. Under Mayor Anne Hidalgo, the city has pursued extensive pedestrianisation, expanded cycling infrastructure, repurposed schoolyards as public spaces, restricted polluting vehicles, and supported local commerce through regulatory and financial interventions. Similar principles have informed Melbourne’s “20-minute neighbourhoods” policy and Portland’s “Healthy Connected Neighbourhood Strategy”, both aimed at reducing car dependence and strengthening local social and economic life.
In the aftermath of the COVID-19 pandemic, the 15-minute city gained prominence as cities sought to reduce long commutes and reinforce local resilience.
These initiatives are driven by shared objectives: lowering emissions, improving public health, and revitalising neighbourhood economies. Yet even among these global frontrunners, the model has attracted significant critique. Urban economist Alain Bertaud argues that metropolitan systems are fundamentally shaped by labour markets rather than neighbourhood amenities, and that no large city can realistically ensure that most residents work within a 15-minute radius of their homes. This critique shifts the debate from neighbourhood design to the structural organisation of urban economies.
On the surface, Indian cities appear well-suited to the 15-minute framework. High-density neighbourhoods, mixed land use, and widespread informal services ensure that daily necessities such as groceries, pharmacies, repair services, and schools are often accessible within walking distance. Street vendors and home-based enterprises further reduce the need for long trips, reinforcing neighbourhood-level convenience.
However, proximity in Indian cities often masks profound inequalities in quality and reliability. Public healthcare facilities are unevenly distributed and overstretched, government schools vary sharply in infrastructure and learning outcomes, and access to recreational or green spaces remains limited in low-income areas. For instance, in Madhya Pradesh, fewer than 1 percent of government schools have digital libraries, while access to smart classrooms remains below 12 percent. These realities underscore the limits of proximity in the absence of quality. Pedestrian infrastructure is similarly inadequate, with footpaths frequently encroached upon, discontinuous, or unsafe.
More critically, residential proximity to daily amenities does little to address access to employment. Economic activity in Indian cities is concentrated in a limited number of business districts, while housing continues to sprawl across metropolitan regions. Although public transport connects these areas, it is often unreliable, unsafe, or inaccessible, leading to long and exhausting commutes. As urbanist Alain Bertaud notes, labour markets require scale and diversity—conditions that inevitably generate cross-city travel.
The most fundamental limitation of the 15-minute city model lies in its approach to employment distribution. Well-functioning cities depend on large, integrated labour markets that allow firms to access talent and workers to access diverse opportunities. Neighbourhood-level proximity does not resolve this challenge. On the contrary, proximity-based planning risks constraining labour markets by implicitly assuming that people should work near home, rather than ensuring efficient access to citywide opportunities.
Other scholars argue that an overemphasis on walkability can undermine the role of public transport, while sociologically, the model risks producing inward-looking neighbourhoods that limit broader urban interaction. Even Paris, often cited as the model’s most successful example, does not enable most residents to access workplaces within a 15-minute radius of their homes. Its economic geography remains regionally integrated, with commute times extending well beyond neighbourhood boundaries.
Proximity-based planning risks constraining labour markets by implicitly assuming that people should work near home, rather than ensuring efficient access to citywide opportunities.
In India, these contradictions are magnified. Employment clusters such as Gurugram, Bengaluru’s Whitefield, and Mumbai’s BKC–Fort corridor lead to long commutes for workers unable to afford housing near their workplaces. The average one-way commute in Indian cities stands at 59 minutes, with women spending even longer due to trip-chaining associated with care responsibilities. Meanwhile, nearly 43 percent of Indian cities lack universally accessible footpaths, severely limiting safe walking as a viable option.
As a result, the benefits of the 15-minute city accrue disproportionately to affluent, centrally located residents who already enjoy high-quality services and flexible work arrangements. For the majority, the model functions less as a planning solution and more as an elitist abstraction that risks reinforcing, rather than reducing, spatial inequality.
For Indian cities, a more realistic approach is to shift the focus from neighbourhood self-sufficiency to metropolitan accessibility. This requires decentralising employment through multiple job centres, while ensuring strong, affordable, and reliable public transport connections across the urban region.
Improving the quality, not merely the proximity, of essential services is equally critical. Informal economies, which already play a central role in neighbourhood accessibility, must be formally recognised within planning frameworks rather than marginalised. Investments in safe, continuous pedestrian infrastructure, particularly in low-income areas, are essential to make walking a dignified option rather than a necessity borne of exclusion.
The 15-minute city offers a valuable reminder that neighbourhood-level accessibility matters, but it cannot substitute for the deeper structural reforms that Indian cities require.
Time-based accessibility metrics can be useful if applied pragmatically. Instead of assuming that people can live close to work, urban policy must acknowledge long commutes as a structural reality and focus on reducing their social, economic, and gendered costs.
The 15-minute city offers a valuable reminder that neighbourhood-level accessibility matters, but it cannot substitute for the deeper structural reforms that Indian cities require. The everyday convenience of dense urban neighbourhoods does little to address unequal access to jobs, quality public services, and reliable transport.
The objective should not be to create self-contained neighbourhoods, but to ensure that all residents, regardless of where they live, can access the full scale of urban opportunity. Without confronting labour market concentration, housing affordability, and transport inequity, the 15-minute city risks becoming a proximity myth: compelling in theory, but exclusionary in practice, revealing a sharp contrast between the model’s promise and lived reality.
Ruchita Bansal is an urban planner and founder of SheCity India, focusing on inclusive, gender-responsive urbanism and the political economy of Indian cities.
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Ruchita Bansal is an urban planner and founder of SheCity India, focusing on inclusive, gender-responsive urbanism and the political economy of Indian cities. ...
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