A civic activist from Lakshmi Nagar
K Sankaran, ex president of Thillai Ganga Nagar residents welfare association and who was part of Exnora, said Nithya came to their neighbourhood in Nanganallur in 2010 to understand traffic woes. But she had good inclination towards urban development and interacted with about 10 residents,” said 84-year-old Sankaran.
“In the late 2000s and early 2010s, Transparent Chennai focused on mapping civic infrastructure, empowering residents and creating data-driven solutions for urban governance,” he said. Rao said Raman and her team worked closely with local citizen groups, including civic activists, to identify and document neighbourhood-level issues. “The data collected was intended to be presented to the Chennai Traffic Police and municipal corporations to help develop actionable solutions,” he said. “She was an urban planner and activist back then, and was curious to understand traffic issues in the neighbourhood and interacted with the locals,” he said.
CHENNAI: Before becoming the mayor of Los Angeles, Nithya Raman worked with civic activists in Chennai to address urban infrastructure and governance issues through community participation and data-driven initiatives. The collaboration involved organising community forums, mapping local traffic problems and collecting data on public transport, pedestrian safety and gaps in civic infrastructure. “We didn’t know she would become a politician and mayor.