New draft plan for KL City

Following the failure to gazette the much-debated draft Kuala Lumpur City Plan 2020 (DKLCP2020), Kuala Lumpur City Hall (DBKL) is now holding discussions for the draft Kuala Lumpur City Plan 2050 (DKLCP2050).

Kuala Lumpur mayor Datuk Seri Mohd Amin Nordin Abd Aziz said its Planning Department was tasked to formulate the plan.

“The 2020 draft plan, which was launched in May 2008, was not feasible because of the difference between the current land value and the value at the time the plan was drafted.

“There is no point in gazetting a draft plan that will expire in three years.

“When the master plan was devised in 2007, the land value was low. Now, land prices in Kuala Lumpur have increased up to RM3,000 per sq ft and the holding cost for property developers is very high.

“We are trying to reduce developers’ cost by speeding up the construction permit approvals,” he said after launching the special zone for motorcycles at the Jalan Raja traffic lights in Kuala Lumpur.

Last month, an English daily had quoted Federal Territories Minister Datuk Seri Tengku Adnan Mansor that DKLCP2020 may not be gazetted.

Most of the Kuala Lumpur MPs expressed shocked over the decision.

DKLCP2020 was launched in May 2008 and was displayed to the public until August the same year.

DBKL conducted public hearings with residents associations, developers, non-governmental organisations and religious groups until June 2009.

The draft plan was initially scheduled to be gazetted in 2012 but was delayed to Feb 28, 2013, as a result of objections and land usage issues that had emerged.

DBKL has spent almost RM30mil to produce the plan and carry out hearings and workshops since 2008.