Islamabad Master Plan back to the drawing board

[Naveed Yaseen]

By Fazal Sher

ISLAMABAD: Capital Development Authority (CDA) has decided to examine the revised version of Islamabad Master Plan to free it of failings, it is learnt.

A CDA official told Daily Times on Tuesday that the authority’s bosses were dissatisfied with the revision of the master plan by Mott McDonald Pakistan (MMP) due to its inability to cater to the town’s future needs on many counts.

He said the CDA Board had asked the Planning Wing to suggest ways and means to address the shortcomings in question within a month and submit to it a revised version of the plan.

He said following the CDA Board’s approval, the master plan would be sent to the cabinet for mandatory consent.

The official said the CDA wanted to engage Doxiadis Associates, a Greek firm that prepared the city’s original master plan in 1960, for the job but couldn’t do so for certain reasons.

The MMP was given the contract to modify the master plan three years ago.

The MMP-revised master plan has focused on the launch of new residential sectors, extension of municipal limits, establishment of another industrial zone, road repairs and creation of new parks in the city.

Under the new plan, the CDA is to extend Islamabad’s municipal limits to the area adjacent to the motorways and increase the numbering series of sectors from 16 to 18.

It also proposes establishment of another industrial zone in I-17, creation of a Fatima Jinnah Park like vast recreational area in E-14 and construction of high-rises in Zones 4 and 5.

The original master plan divides Islamabad into four parts: Rawalpindi (259 square kilometres), Islamabad Proper, inclusive of institutional and industrial areas (220.15 square kilometres), Islamabad Park (220.15 square kilometres) and Islamabad Rural Areas (466.20 square kilometres).

http://www.dailytimes.com.pk/default.asp...008_pg11_6