KARACHI, Oct 27: The creation of a potent and capable planning agency with necessary statutory cover is vital for Karachi, which is functioning without a master plan. Presently an attempt is made to make some thing called as a master plan, but that is grossly inadequate.
These views were expressed by Dr Noman Ahmed, Chairman, Department of Architect and Town Planning, NED University, while speaking at a seminar on “Karachi’s desperate need for effective municipal laws”, organized by the Pakistan Press Foundation (PPF) at its Vicky Zeitlin Media Library here on Thursday.
Planning is a continuous process and cannot be packaged into a one-time assignment, the speaker stressed.
He emphasized that land use and development control must be enforced, as at present land was freely traded as a commodity, which was a flawed practice.
Land is a precious asset and must be used for the larger benefit of the citizens and the city. If proper land allocations for major urban functions are judiciously made and enforced, only then a sizable improvement can be achieved in urban governance, Dr Ahmed said.
He said that for instance, the city desperately needed a new urban road running from north to south to offset existing vehicular congestion. Limited opportunities exist to procure that type of land space due to the uncontrolled commercialization all around the city he added saying that the municipal governance was tightly controlled and influenced by the federal and provincial administrations-at times in quasi illegal manners.
Legal and administrative autonomy is a must for the city government and other district governments for smooth city functioning, he said.
Dr Ahmed said that the issues of katchi abadis regularization needed legal and administrative streamlining.
The existing provisions are obsolete and does not account for the emerging ground realities. Infrastructural provisions need a specific realignment for service provision, he stressed.
Identifying water supply, sewerage, transport and housing for urban poor as most important issues in cities like Karachi, he said KWSB needed a restructuring, bulk supply to be managed by the it, while distribution and revenue recovery to be decentralized to the towns.
He said that the existing sewers and nullas needed to be consolidated with the treatment plants built at their discharge ends.
There should be control on the emerging number of motor cars and subsidy should be given for public transport. More bypasses should be developed to route out goods transport, urban railways be resurrected in relevance to the ground realities, effective traffic surveillance and management be ensured. For housing, credit support should be offered to the poor for accessing land, he suggested.
The speaker stressed the need for the implementation of building laws, as it has become a common practice to carry-out construction work without following the plans approved by the Karachi Building Control Authority (KBCA).
Other speaker Solicitor and District and Session Judge, Hanif Solangi, said that adequate laws were in place regarding building control, environment, municipal laws etc, but it was the responsibility of the concerned departments to ensure their effective implementation.—PPI
