KARACHI, Aug 3: Baldia, Lyari and Liaquatabad suffer more than other towns of the metropolis in providing adequate land to their residents for recreational activities, reveals an official document of the City District Government Karachi.

The document says that the city has a fair number of recreational parks and gardens at the metropolitan level but inadequate playgrounds and sports facilities for ‘active recreation’ by different age groups at the local level. This includes stadiums, indoor gymnasiums, football and hockey grounds, cricket fields and tennis courts. This deficiency is particularly true for the heavily built-up areas of Liaquatabad, Lyari, Kharadar and their immediate surroundings. Wherever facilities exist they are ill-maintained and substandard, according to the document.

It says that recreational lands are not distributed evenly across the city and some areas are seriously deficient in this regard.

A land use survey shows that around 4,800 acres are being used for recreational activities in Karachi, which gives an overall average of 0.34 acre recreational area for 1,000 persons.

However owing to rampant encroachment, a few towns like Korangi and North Karachi have ratios lower than other towns i.e. 0.17 acre and 0.19 acre per 1,000 persons respectively. Even lesser are the ratios of Liaquatabad and Lyari; each offering 0.06 acre land for recreational activities of thousand persons on an average. Baldia with a ratio of 0.03 acre is the most deprived town of the city as far as recreational facilities are concerned.

Safari Park covering an area of 354 hectares, National Stadium and Coaching Centre, all located in Gulshan-i-Iqbal Town, make an average of 0.75 acre recreational land for 1,000 persons each.

The document strongly recommends to the city government to take serious steps for provision of ample recreational facilities to the people of Karachi.

Though the city government has announced some ambitious projects like the River Valley Park along Malir riverbed, which is yet to be formally launched, the last year’s Mission Greener Karachi has already hit snags due to jurisdictional disputes between the parks and forest departments.