The local government will bring before next week's plenary session the modification of the sectors known as Garduix I and II, Pla Feliu I and II, and Ráfol I and II as developable land with the aim of reclassifying them as green space and land for public use.
The sectors of Ráfol I and II, Feliu I and II and Garduix I and II make up a large green lung of more than 300,000 m² in a residential development area.000 m² in a residential development area. These sectors already appear in the 1998 General Urban Development Plan (PGOU) as developable land, but they are rural plots that have not been programmed for 27 years and therefore the regulations allow the administration to declassify them.
The City Council intends to acquire the land by compensating the owners for expropriation in accordance with the nature of the land as rural, i.e. when compensating the owners, the land will be valued as it stands and not for the urban development rights that have not been realised.
In November last year, the declassification process began, requiring the technical services to draw up a draft and an initial strategic document setting out the characteristics of the sectors and the needs. Both documents will be submitted to the plenary session on Tuesday and, once approved, will be forwarded to the Territorial Planning Commission of the Valencian Regional Government, which is responsible for continuing the process.
As this is a structural change to the General Urban Development Plan, the City Council can propose the declassification of the sectors, but the next steps in the process are the responsibility of the Regional Ministry.
The local government has put forward four main reasons for making this change to the PGOU: to preserve a large area of forest in the Garduix and Feliu areas, which will become green space, and to promote land for public use in the Ráfol area in order to obtain land for educational, cultural, recreational or sports purposes.
However, there are also plans to consolidate temporary uses, such as the land occupied by the IES Les Salines secondary school, which, although a green area, obtained provisional authorisation for educational use, and the plot in Rafol occupied by the General Services building, which will become land for public services. In both cases, educational and service uses will be consolidated.
Also in Ráfol, there is a strip of land adjacent to the Barranco del Quisi ravine that is classified as developable and, in compliance with the PATRICOVA guidelines regarding the impact on ravines, is now becoming a green area.
This reclassification modifies the urban dynamics of the municipality and also proposes a different way of compensating owners, as it will not be done through development units or by increasing the volume in other areas, as has been the case until now. This decision paves the way for a new approach to urban planning in the municipality.