Coastal connections: transitioning towards socio-ecological resilience through productive commons and maritime culture in Ratnagiri Maharashtra

Abstract

There is a need to reimagine the way we think about our coastal commons. – Vikrom Mathur, Senior Fellow, Observer Research Foundation India’s 11,000km-long coastline – bordered by the Arabian Sea, Bay of Bengal, and Indian Ocean – has historically supported thriving maritime culture and economies, rich biodiversity, and deeply rooted cultural practices. While large coastal cities like Mumbai, Chennai, and Kolkata dominate attention around coastal urbanism, smaller coastal towns remain overlooked in policy and planning narratives. According to NASA’s Sea Level Projection tool, 9 out of 12 most vulnerable Indian coastal cities are small towns – signaling an urgent need for localised, adaptive strategies to build resilience. Coastal towns serve as vital socio-ecological interfaces shaped by maritime cultural landscapes, traditional fishing livelihoods, and seasonal ecosystems. These towns are repositories of local knowledge, traditional economies, and ecological stewardship. Ratnagiri, a historic port town on Maharashtra’s Konkan coast, exemplifies this interplay – where traditional Konkan settlements, fishing livelihoods, estuarine ecologies, and community-shared coastal commons such as local fishing zones, fishing jetties, mudflats, mangroves, and seasonal wetlands converge to form a maritime cultural landscape. Yet these coastal commons are becoming increasingly marginalised. Rather than experiencing abrupt decline, they face gradual erosion through neglect and misuse, unchecked encroachment, and ecological degradation. The urban form of the town is changing due to urban expansion. This has led to the spatial and visual disconnection of it’s waterfront from the rest of the town and weakened traditional coastal identity-place attachment. This thesis questions the urban design possibilities for re-establishing meaningful connections between the town and it’s maritime edge while safeguarding the coastal resilience. The thesis aims to provide urban design guidelines to reimagine the coastline accessibility of Ratnagiri using the concepts of urban commons framework, place-based urbanism, and continuous productive urban landscape (CPUL). The literature examines coastal settlement typologies, socio-ecological systems of coastal towns, and dynamic estuarine landscapes. Moreover, governance challenges shaped by the Coastal Regulation Zone (CRZ) framework reveal the limitations of current planning policies in effectively responding to the evolving nature of coastal environments. The thesis focuses on a key precinct around the Kajali Estuary – areas characterised by dense settlement sprawl, ecologically sensitive zones, and local fishing activities. In response, the proposal offers an integrated urban design approach, interweaving spatial, economic, and ecological systems by developing a network of multifunctional coastal commons – spatial zoning to integrate maritime culture and adaptive public spaces; an economic spatial model of productive commons; and nature-based infrastructure for coastal edge preservation. By reframing the coastal edge not as a boundary but as a productive interface of culture, economy, and ecology, this thesis advocates for a coastal urbanism model that enables small port towns to adapt without erasing their identity. Ratnagiri is both a case and a catalyst for imagining a resilient, and regenerative future for India’s smaller coastal settlements. Keywords: Small Coastal Towns, Coastal Commons, Maritime Cultural, Socio-ecological Systems, Continuous Productive Urban Lands cape (CPUL)