Deccan Chronicle      17.12.2010

Master Plan delay holds up Kovai growth

December 17th, 2010

Dec. 16: It has been 18 years since the release of the last Master Plan for the city and though work on the new plan is almost complete and has been submitted to the government, the draft has yet to be released for a public hearing for objections and suggestions. Officials here feel that the Master Plan is being unduly delayed and say this is hampering development work in the fast-growing city.

Pointing out that future development of the city could only be based on the Master Plan, Coimbatore Consumer Cause secretary K. Kathirmathiyon says talk about the plan being prepared has been going on since 2004. “The plan should be revised at least once in 10 years to ensure proper growth, but 18 years have passed and people in Coimbatore are still waiting for it,” he pointed out.

The Master Plan will contain details of the classification of land and purpose of use, new roads to come up and marking of reserved sites and agricultural land. With the growth of real estate, industries and Information Technology, the plan will help identify the amount of land that should be used for different purposes.

Due to lack of awareness among people, efforts were not taken to develop reserved sites as parks or grounds for public use. Once the new plan is released, it will be put up on the Internet, based on which the industries can plan their project.

District collector P. Umanath said, “We have been awaiting its early release as we can plan development activities in and around the city based on the plan. But we do not have any idea when it will be released.”

When asked about the delay in the release of draft plan, DTCP director Pankaj Kumar Bansal said the state would “at any time release the draft plan” as it has been submitted to them for clearance. He added that with the corporation’s area expanding, the draft plan would indicate the expansion of the Local Planning Authority’s (LPA) jurisdiction to over 1.9 lakh hectares from the existing 1.27 lakh hectares.

The draft plan, once released, will be placed before the public for 60 days to hear objections and suggestions, if any. These will then be incorporated and returned to the state for release of the final plan as the new Master Plan for the city’s development.