PANJIM: The Goa Goa Bachao Abhiyan (GBA) has expressed its shock at the decision of the Town and Country Planning (TCP) Department to increase Floor Area Ratio (FAR) for hotels and to strengthen ‘unconstitutional’ 16b of TCP Act, presently a subjudice matter.
It has demanded that the government should immediately withdraw such decisions and follow a proper planning process for a Regional Plan.
“The GBA is shocked at the statements of TCP Department after its Board meeting where the focus was on increasing FAR for hotels and strengthening unconstitutional Section 16b of the TCP Act, which is challenged in court for the unfair practice of placing individual interest over public interest,” GBA Convenor Sabina Martins said.
“This is simply about more concrete with no thought to infrastructure such as roads, power and electricity. Instead of strengthening enforcement against illegal activities and protection of environment, we have blanket increase of FAR made to sound like an achievement of planning,” Martins said.
Taking pressure off congested areas namely Panjim, makes sense but jumping straight to FAR of 400 is something that even Noida does not have; picture the disaster in the making. These concrete jungles that represent the limit of TCP Department’s imagination are based on bad practice of the Western world on the last century without contemporary wisdom of infrastructure, roads and climate change. Concentration of concrete creates heat islands that are unbearable in today’s heat waves, only set to get worse in India,” Martins and General Secretary Reboni Saha said.
“The Floor Area Ratio (FAR) is a measure of how much can be built on a footprint of land. Goan villages bearing the brunt of overbuilding are currently between 60 per cent and 80 per cent, while urban areas namely Panjim, Central Business District go up to 250 per cent. Cities such as Mumbai, Bangalore and Noida provide between 133 per cent and 350 per cent with only redevelopment schemes allowing 400 per cent,” they said.
The GBA stated that additional FAR has been granted for hotels in the name of ‘tourism’ without any caveat of road width, fire and safety preconditions. Why would tourists come, to a place with more traffic jams than their own urban hometowns, is a question we need to ask in conjunction with how we envisage Goa in the master plan that is the Regional Plan.
Allocating the Kadamba plateau with 400 FAR and ‘Strengthening Section 16b’ are counterproductive and are a terrible start for Goa, the GBA said objecting to TCP’s arbitrary decision on FAR and 16b. It has called upon the government to withdraw the decision of increasing FAR for hotels and to cease random decisions and follow a proper planning process for a Regional Plan.
