Parking plaza construction halts just after kicking off

[Lahore_Real_Estate]

* Hoteliers claim plaza site land as hotels parking g RDA, hotels’ owners talks fail

Staff Report

RAWALPINDI: The construction work of the first ever parking plaza in the city was halted just after it kicked off on Thursday morning due to protest by owners of hotels located on one side of the parking plaza site. High-ups of Rawalpindi Development Authority (RDA) reached the site but the matter could not be resolved.

RDA had awarded the contract to a firm named Amanat and Company to construct a four-storied parking plaza at Fowara Chowk. After the issuance of the work order, the boundary lines of the plaza were built and all the necessary preparations were made to start construction work. However, on Thursday, when the Supervisor, along with his laborers, reached the site to initiate the project, the owners and workers of almost six nearby hotels forced them to stop the construction work.

The hotel owners claimed that the land belonged to them and any construction there by the RDA was illegal. The Project Supervisor, on behalf of contractors, tried to negotiate with the agitating people but they refused to listen to him.

On this RDA Director General Makeen Shahbaz along with other officers reached the project site to control the situation. The hotel owners were carrying a map drafted in 1953 according to which the proposed site of the project was mentioned as the parking of their hotels. The RDA head took plea that non-operational Rawalpindi Improvement Trust (RIT) acquired the land on 100 years lease from Rawalpindi Municipal Corporation in 1969. Later, RIT was transformed into RDA. As the lease period was not over, all the property formerly possessed by the trust now belongs to the authority, he said.

However, the RDA DG offered them 13 feet land although, according to official record, only five feet land belonged to them. But the hotel owners demanded no less than 20 feet land. On this the talks stalled and construction work of the project was halted till the resolution of the dispute.