Suburban areas to get permission to go beyond four-storey buildings

The government is mulling over a plan to allow people to construct multi-storey buildings in suburban areas next to the capital to reduce the population density of the city.

They can also increase the height of existing buildings with permission from the authorities concerned if the foundation for a certain height of the said building has already been approved.

Previously, some 182 square kilometers of areas under the Detailed Area Plan (DAP) jurisdiction was identified as Grameen Basoti (rural residence) and buildings were not allowed to go beyond two-storey ones.

But the new DAP has cancelled the earlier idea to bring all those land under development resulting in a huge boost for those residential areas.

According to Rajuk, the residential area in Gazipur increased to 42,135 acres of land from 19,967 acres of land.

In Keraniganj the land increased from 15,433 acres of land to 7,965 acres of land, in Kaliganj it increased to 22,214 from 6,151 acres of land, in Narayanganj 24,727 from 18,197 acres of land and in Savar 26,531 from 17.481 acres of land.

DAP distributed land under certain categories and it determines the functions of the land. And so, if any land is identified as reservoir no one can get permission to erect any building there.

Similarly, if any place is identified as residential area commercial buildings are prohibited here.

In the latest DAP the authorities have reduced land categories from 17 to 13. The reductions of land categories have enabled many lands to be included as residential lands.

Rajuk officials who are very close to the formulation of the plan said it would be a holistic approach to not only determine accommodation but also reduce traffic on roads and make the city livable.

The initial plan is to reduce population density in the city enabling people to stay near their job location and provide citizenship facilities like educational institution and good healthcare.

If it can be ensured, daily mass movement will be reduced. When pressure on roads is less traffic will automatically come down, they said.

If the capital’s population keeps growing in this way, the population in the capital will reach 66 million by 2035 and it will be an unbearable load for the city that will eventually be choked to death.

To make the city more livable and sustainable Rajuk wants to keep the population within 22 million by 2035.

For the capital city, the population density on an acre should be 200, 220 and 250 depending on the location. For Narayanganj and Gazipur it should be 180 and as for other suburban areas it should be 160.

Rajuk official said if the density is 200 on an acre of land per square mile population in 2035 will stand at 50,000, a lot more than any other megacities in the world.

According to Statista, Dhaka is currently the most densely populated city in the world with over 30,000 people per square kilometer.

Project Director of the plan and Rajuk Town planner Ashraful Islam said being the guardian of the city Rajuk wants to decentralize the residential areas of the city.

Some places have been identified as the key zones from where people take hours to go to offices.

Rajuk wants to shift the population to nearby areas ensuring citizenship facilities like education, healthcare and good transportation system so that they don’t need not to travel unnecessarily for long hours every day.

For this reason, residential construction at suburban areas has been encouraged through the project, he added.

Previously, in these areas no buildings were allowed to go beyond two floors. With new development now there can be over four-storey buildings.

Besides, if they take new measures to meet local demands for education, health or recreation, they would get incentives for the construction as well, the Rajuk official said.

Syeda Rizwana Hasan, however, sees some adverse impact of changing the land categories as she fears that the change can cause occupancy of the low lying suburban areas and turning them into residential areas after land filling.

Rajuk needs to be very strict to implement its plan. “But previous experiences do not hold out any hope for us,” she warns.