Survey begins for George Town redevelopment

According to a CMDA official, college students have been appointed to collect details of every building in the area through a door-to-door survey. The entire George Town area is segregated into 20 blocks for conducting the survey.

“In total, more than 11,300 in George Town is segregated into 20 blocks for the ease of carrying out the survey. We have created a smartphone application to store the collected details,” the official said. Presently, details have been collected from more than 600 buildings and survey works will be completed in around six months.

Meanwhile, the CMDA is yet to devise a plan to implement the redevelopment and awaits the completion of the survey. “We can only prepare a redevelopment plan based on the survey result and we should devise a plan that will be acceptable to the majority of the building owners,” the official added. One of the oldest neighbourhoods in the city spread over 370 acres, it has only 73 buildings that abide by the planning norms. The Justice Rajeshwaran Committee, appointed to study the George Town area, identified that more than 99 per cent of buildings in the locality have contravened the building norms.

The central government has sanctioned about Rs 2 crore under Atal Mission for Rejuvenation and Urban Transformation (AMRUT) to meet the expenses of preparing the redevelopment plan for George Town. Using the fund, CMDA is carrying out the survey. The fund was sanctioned in September 2019.

“George Town was developed before the town planning rules were framed and the area has an unplanned development. The roads and streets in George Town are too narrow in which even emergency service vehicles including ambulances could not enter,” the official said. The redevelopment plan would propose wider roads, public open spaces, better ventilation and other social infrastructural facilities.