[Pramāṇa](https://indike.org/pramana/) › [Studies](https://indike.org/pramana/ins) › [Architecture and art](https://indike.org/pramana/ins.art) › [Town Planning in Ancient India](https://indike.org/pramana/ins.art.dutt-1925) › c9.2 # Town Planning in Ancient India c9.2 Town Planning in Ancient India c9.2 - **Language:** English ### [c9.2](https://indike.org/pramana/ins.art.dutt-1925.c9.2) One of the most important functions of a civic architect is lay-out of the streets. The roads serve two purposes : firstly, they are highways for traffic : secondly, they divide the sites for buildings. Incidentally and, as a matter of course, they have sanitary value, providing arteries of free ventilation. Hence in subservience to their primary purpose, streets should conform to the requirements of the principal currents of traffic circulation. They should be so laid out as to guarantee easy and speedy passage from one quarter of the town to another, especially to those centres of public importance to which will generally converge the mass of citizens, e.g., a market, a court, a council, a bank, a university—all institutions of corporate life. Besides, upon their construction coupled with that of the buildings, depends the quantity of sunlight and ventilation the latter can receive. The width of the thoroughfares must be commensurate with and adequate for the volume of traffic through them; and the streets as well as their cross-sections should be so adjusted as to minimise the probability of collision between two or more converging currents of traffic circulation. - [Previous: c8.132](https://indike.org/pramana/ins.art.dutt-1925.c8.132) - [Next: c9.3](https://indike.org/pramana/ins.art.dutt-1925.c9.3) - [Up: c9](https://indike.org/pramana/ins.art.dutt-1925.c9) --- Source: [https://indike.org/pramana/ins.art.dutt-1925.c9.2](https://indike.org/pramana/ins.art.dutt-1925.c9.2) · Pramāṇa