Commercial plazas allowed additional storeys

[Salman]

Commercial plazas allowed additional storeys

ISLAMABAD, June 14: The city managers have allowed second additional storey on existing commercial plazas and formed a committee to deal with such cases.

The decision was taken by the Capital Development Board at a meeting on Wednesday.

In 1999, the CDA had allowed first additional storey on the already constructed commercial buildings. “We allowed second additional storey to control illegal construction of storeys on commercial buildings,” said the CDA member planning while talking to Dawn on Thursday.

He said there were complaints that people were constructing additional storeys on commercial buildings without permission of the CDA, and thus they evaded paying the mandatory fees to the authority. The official said the owners of commercial plazas used to move courts whenever the civic agency took action against them.

“With the permission of an additional storey, at least the authority will be able to generate income by collecting extra charges from the plaza owners,” said the member planning.

He said commercial centres like Super Market and Jinnah Super required additional stoeys because the present structures are inadequate to cater to the need of customers.

The CDA board meeting also formed a three-member committee which will review applications for the constructing additional storeys.

Legislators in May 2011 had asked the city managers not to allow construction of an additional storey in commercial buildings unless their structures were cleared in the light of seismic rules.

On this, the CDA officials had assured the Senate standing committee that they would ensure safety requirements in the new buildings.The provision of additional storey in commercial buildings was included in CDA building by-laws in 1999. Since then
166 additional floors have been added to different buildings in the city. Of them 117 were approved by the CDA.

Of the 49 illegally-constructed additional storeys, 25 have already been legalised while cases of the remaining 24 are pending with the authority’s building control directorate.

At present, construction of an additional storey on commercial buildings is allowed on payment of Rs2,700 per square yard in the posh I-8 and F sectors. The charges were Rs7,000 per square yard in 2002. The rate for G sectors and I sectors (except I-8) is Rs1,800 per square yard against Rs4,000 per square yard earlier.