The Times of India            15.02.2014

Coimbatore master plan to be delayed by two months

COIMBATORE: The wait for Coimbatore Master Plan is expected to be delayed by another two months as the Geographical Information System (GIS) mapping exercise to determine the existing land use patterns will not be completed by the February 28 deadline.

The 18 member team of volunteers from Centre for Geographical Information Technologies (CGIT), Bharathidasan University in Trichy, are presently engaged in mapping out the existing land use patterns in the district. The draft land use pattern is now expected to be submitted by the end of March.

"Our team has already covered the rural areas and have returned from Coimbatore on February 2. Now there will be two more phases of the exercise each lasting about 12 to 14 days in which the remaining areas are expected to be covered in urban Coimbatore," said S Vasudevan, coordinator, Centre for Geographical Information Systems.

The exercise will be carried out by a two member team of specially trained team people and each team will be entrusted with a vehicle. The Directorate of Town and Country Planning has categorised land use patterns into 108 sections each detailing a specific purpose. The teams will be handed out 1:2000 scaled grid maps which will cover 1.5km area on the east and west directions and one km in north and south directions. The vehicle used by the team will be directly monitored on real time basis from the CGIT centre as part of the internal monitoring exercise.

"The existing land use patterns are being digitally mapped for cross verification purpose. We are waiting for the exercise to get completed," said LPA sources. The mapping exercise is based on tracking the latitudinal and longitudinal position and to classify how the specific plot is being used at the moment. The state government had entrusted the GIS mapping work for Hosur in Krishnagiri district, Trichy, Madurai, Tuticorin, Tirupur, Erode and Coimbatore.

"We have divided Coimbatore into 1100 rural and 1800 urban grids. We expect to complete the process by March 31. We are planning to submit the draft mapping report to the Directorate of Town and Country Planning for Hosur in the coming week," Vasudevan added

Coimbatore residents have been waiting for the final master plan and had even submitted more than 3000 suggestions and modifications, most pertaining to the land use pattern in the district. It is expected that the master plan for Coimbatore will be finalised a couple of months after the general elections.