Juhu, Santa Cruz and Vile Parle

See also the document on the Northern Suburbs.

C19 [Image] The open beaches of Juhu have attracted the well-heeled among Bombay's population for almost a century. In the 1890's Jamsetji Tata purchased land in Juhu and built a bungalow there. He planned to develop 1200 acres in Juhu Tara. This was to yield 500 plots of one acre each and a seaside resort. Simultaneously he wanted to extend the Mahim- Bandra causeway to Santa Cruz, in order to provide access to this area. The city turned down this plan in 1903. After his death in the same year, the scheme was abandoned.

C20 Development took off by the second decade of the century with the extension of the Western Trunk Route to Jogeshwari. By the 1930's Juhu had become a recreational centre. The richer classes of Bombay used the area for sports, bathing and motoring. Weekend cottages and bungalows mushroomed around this time. The neighbouring regions of Santa Cruz and Vile Parle were also opened up at the same time.

When J. R. D. Tata landed a Gypsy Moth on the mud flats of Juhu in October 1932, he started a process that changed the functions of the suburbs forever. An airport eventually came up in Santa Cruz, thus creating, for the first time, an amenity for the city which did not exist in the centre.

By the 1920's these areas had developed sufficiently to warrant their own local government and municipal councils. They formed part of the so called Suburban District. By the late 1930's the municipality of Vile Parle had absorbed the smaller bodies around it. Then with the formation of Greater Bombay in 1945, the areas came directly under the Bombay Municipal Corporation.