LAHORE: Lahore’s major and fast-growing business corridor — Pine Avenue — is set to be given commercial status by the Lahore Development Authority (LDA) and the revision of DC rates for property valuation has begun.
A senior Punjab government official had recently expressed wonder when he learnt about the current status of the corridor, imposition of penalties by the LDA on illegally built structures. He also directed the LDA to grant commercial status to the corridor to earn revenue instead of keeping mum over the current situation, with the road to have Punjab’s largest cancer hospital likely to be opened in a month or so.
“We have a plan to give commercial status to this road — especially those stretches having residential properties on both sides which are being used for commercial purposes. By the end of this year, we will accomplish this work,” LDA Director General Tahir Farooq said while talking to Dawn.
“This is being done keeping in view the huge footfall, increasing traffic, illegal commercial use and no income to the government and other issues,” he added. Mr Farooq said the reasons behind delay in commercialising Pine Avenue were the current DC rates, which were very low and liable to be revised. If LDA gave commercial status to this road with immediate effect, the revenue would be very little, he explained.
It merits mentioning that there are various kinds of properties along both sides of Pine Avenue. These include commercial properties whose owners were in the process of surrendering land to the government for the construction of the road, residential properties facing Pine Avenue in various housing schemes and privately-owned plots facing the road.
According to a proposal, the already-commercialised area consisted of nearly 279 kanals, however, 4,472 kanals of area was yet to be commercialised. Besides this, the 8.7km area along the road, passing through different private housing societies, will also be commercialised. The proposal floated in the first quarter of this year also suggested introducing uniform commercialisation on the Pine Avenue in a bid to earn revenue projected to be around Rs134 billion in commercialisation fee in the next five years.
The proposal aimed to control unplanned and illegal commercialisation on Pine Avenue, given its strategic importance in terms of connectivity from all sides. The growing population, development of huge infrastructure, especially the country’s largest cancer hospital to be built by the Punjab government, and several other private sector projects, increasing footfall and the growing number of vehicles passing through it daily have also necessitated this plan.
According to the proposal, commercial activity should be allowed on those properties having 200 feet depth from the Pine Avenue. To start a commercial project, the proposal recommended forcing the owners to leave a 40-feet setback area from the front for parking, adequate pedestrian movement, visual uniformity and other permissible uses under the law for launch of any mega commercial project. The height of buildings was also recommended to be not more than 200 feet, with uniform facade designs approved by the LDA.
Meanwhile, remodeling of the Pine Avenue has also been planned with provision of state-of-the-art civic facilities, including an underpass at an intersection connecting the New Defence Road and other localities.
“Keeping in view the significance of Pine Avenue, we will make it a state-of-the art business corridor in Lahore,” the LDA DG maintained.
Published in Dawn, October 23rd, 2026
