SLC members prepared for personal visits to rectify RP21
GOANEWS DESK, PANAJI | 12 December 2011 20:30 IST
“We are open for any corrections of errors in the Regional Plan 2021 and even prepared to visit the areas personally if required”, said Padmavibhushan Charles Correa, renowned architect of international repute and member of the State Level Committee (SLC).
All the four members of the SLC – Correa, Dean D’Cruz, Rahul Deshpande and Bryan Soares – had TV programme Jagor on Prudent TV, Goa’s leading TV channel.
During the debate, the SLC members refuted the charge that their plan is builder-friendly. On the contrary, they explained with maps and figures how the plan is detrimental to mega projects and huge housing projects in the villages.
While reacting to the demand of scrapping the plan and redrafting it through participative process, Deshpande informed that the town and country planning department had received only 13 applications demanding scrapping of the plan, without citing any reason.
“The rest of the applications cater to other corrective measures suggested by the public and individuals”, he said.
When asked about widening the roads – 25 metres as Major District Roads (MID) to connect villages and 10 metres in the villages, Soares said this was suggested way back in 1977 and not by the SLC.
“Being architects, we thought of becoming more transparent and showed on the map how wide it would be”, he said.
Adding further, Deshpande said the 25-metre road would actually have motorable road of 12 metre while 10-metre village road would be actually six to seven metres.
The rest of the area is meant for footpaths and tree plantation etc, added D’Cruz.
Regarding adding component of Eco-tourism zone which did not exist in the draft regional plan, Deshpande showed in the debate the requests received from the gramsabhas for tourist projects.
“Rather than blindly implementing the demands of the people, we decided to propose eco-friendly green tourism projects where only 10 per cent of land could be utilized with restriction on the height”, said Correa.
Regarding another post-draft plan insertion of Micro Industrial Zone, Deshpande said they have renamed it as Village Employment Zone for small business activities like a garage etc only for the locals.
The one-hour long debate is available for viewing on Prudent website. (All 4 parts of the debate are available in Jagor section of the website).
If the members did not or could not visit the places from where suggestions for modifications could not be desired by the people, over a period of two years, are they expected to complete the process in another like period?