What are the environmental implications of the reclamation of water bodies into urban land use? Explain with examples?

The Water Bodies in urban areas provide a diversity of values and uses ranging from ecological goods and services to direct production values. However, Land reclamation has become one of the contested issues with regards to the degradation of these bodies.

Some of the environmental implications of the reclamation of water bodies into the urban land use are as follows:

1. Water pollution: Encroachment of water bodies lead to concentration of harmful chemicals. Example: encroachment of water bodies in Bengal have led to arsenic pollution.

2. Urban Flooding: There has been an increasing trend of urban flood disasters in India over the past several years. E.g.: Mumbai.

3. Urban Pollution: The water bodies have been turned into landfills in several cases. Assam’s Deepor beel has been used to dump solid waste since 2006. 

4. Encroachment Issues: Urban land transformation leads to creation of residential, commercial buildings, causing degradation of water ecology. Example: Dal Lake

5. Deforestation leading to accelerated runoff: Water bodies act as sponges for extra rainfall, reclamation of water bodies, has led to higher incidences of floods. Example wetlands in Chennai. 

6. Environmental hazards like soil liquefaction: Reclaimed land is highly susceptible to soil liquefaction during earthquakes. 

Water bodies play an important part in sustaining the ecology. In this light their conservation through waste water treatment, non-encroachment, reduced anthropogenic stress etc., is an imperative.