Master Plan 2031: GDA board holds draft plans for Ghaziabad city, Loni

The plan for the Ghaziabad city was put on hold as authority wants to invite public objection for the non-conforming zones

In a meeting held on Friday, the board of the Ghaziabad Development Authority cleared the draft Master Plan 2031 for Modinagar/Muradnagar, officials aware of the development said, adding that for Loni and Ghaziabad city, the authority has asked the development agency to invite public objections first before clearing the plan .

The draft Master Plan 2031 which includes macro plans for Ghaziabad city, Loni and Modinagar/Muradnagar, was taken up by the board in its meeting held in Meerut and chaired by divisional commissioner of Meerut. The new plan will replace the existing 2021 plan which was prepared in 2004-05.

According to Rajesh Kumar Singh, secretary of GDA, the objections will be invited on “three points” for Ghaziabad and Loni.

One of the proposals, in which Duhai depot station is to be declared as one of the stations for Regional Rapid Transit System (RRTS) falls under the plan for Ghaziabad city. “Declaring Duhai depot as a station would be making available mixed land use and defining it as a transit-oriented zone (TOD). So, the board has asked to invite public objections for 15 days for this proposal of the draft plan,” said Rajesh Kumar Singh, secretary of GDA.

On a second note, the plan for the Ghaziabad city was put on hold as authority wants to invite public objection for the non-conforming zones.

“Further, public objections will also be invited for the Ghaziabad city’s plan for non-conforming zones (on account of land use changes in different areas). So, the Ghaziabad city plan was put on hold in wake of these two objections. Meanwhile for Loni, the board asked to invite public objections for non-conforming zones,” Singh said.

Singh added that once these objections are disposed of, the revised plans incorporating these changes will be taken again before the board and will be presented for further approval likely within a month.

According to officials, the NCR transport corporation (NCRTC), developing the RRTS project, will be preparing the zonal plan for the TOD zones for all eight stations under the RRTS project in Ghaziabad.

Officials said that the 2031 draft plan involves development activities planned over an area of about 3,473 hectares.

An area of 1,389.2 hectares has been reserved for residential use, 208.38 hectares for commercial use, 486.22 for industrial, 347.3 hectares for public and semi-public utilities (like parks, green spaces etc), and 555.68 hectares for recreational use and 486.22 hectares for development of transport and communication facilities.

The GDA officials said the authority has also made provisions for 1060.06 hectares for two SDAs – 510.56 hectares at Guldhar and 549.5 hectares at Duhai. Besides that, the authority has also overall earmarked 5601.11 hectares of TOD zones around seven RRTS stations (total of 4044.58 hectares) and Metro’s Red Line corridor from New Bus Adda to Dilshad Garden (1553.53 hectares) in Ghaziabad.

The officials of the NCRTC said that they are working closely with the district authorities and TOD will prove to be one of the most effective tools for sustainability of the project in the long run.

“The NCRTC is actively working with the development authorities of Ghaziabad and Meerut to develop the identified influence zones along the Ghaziabad-Meerut RRTS corridor as per the newly approved TOD policy, 2022 of the UP government,” said Puneet Vats, chief PRO of NCRTC.

The Uttar Pradesh government’s new policy has defined three types of TOD zones.

The first one is the “corridor TOD zone” in a 500 metre radius of the mass transit alignment, while the second encompasses areas in a 1.5km radius of stations.

The third is defined as a “high potential zone” that will include special areas alongside high speed train corridors, expressways, and highways.

The authority officials said that TOD zones or mixed land use zones for development of residential, commercial and other types of constructions have been specified as area in 1.5km radius of RRTS stations and a 500m radius of the mass transit lines.