Strengthening public participation in planning

Mandatory law, the legal system of town planning in Israel, modified by Israel’s planning law of 1965, insures that the public will not intervene in the business of planning. Reinforcing statutory review and expansion of the public’s legal rights are essential to improving Israel’s town planning situation.

According to the law changes to existing or new town planning schemes require the approval of the Local (municipal) Committee made up of members of the City Council – laymen, headed by the Asst. Mayor and advised by professionals in the City Engineer’s department. Only after approval by the Local Committee and the plan deposited in the District Committee, sometimes after years of work, are notices of changes posted and plan documents made available for public inspection and formal objections. 60 days are given to respond.

Objecting to a Town Planning Scheme is no simple matter. Architect’s and lawyer’s advice can be costly. The few objections which manage to pass through this filtering process are invariably dismissed. Truth be told, decisions are sometimes taken secretly before committee members enter the hearing room. The final power of approval rests with the District Committee which tends to rubber stamp plans backed by our national and local governments.
Dramatic changes tied to the objection phase have taken place over the last few years. A series of strategies for overcoming objections have been instituted by the authorities to satisfy real estate developer’s insatiable greed and save time. By forwarding major plans to National Committees for example, public objections are entirely bypassed. There’s far less patience to hear objections based on quality of life. As for Urban Renewal – destroy/build projects, the rights of apartment owners have been severely abrogated by slashing the number of owner’s necessary for a plan’s approval to 51%, 66% and 80% required in the past.

Almost unheard of are objections accepted on the basis of town planning or aesthetics. Comprehensive three dimensional, long-range planning is rare. Aesthetic policies simply don’t exist. Over a thousand objections to the extremely sensitive proposal to build a cable car on huge pylons, transporting people to the Old City in Jerusalem were rejected as were hundreds of objections to a 40 story tower opposite Yad Vashem. The objection process today is completely ineffective. Revising the law strengthening public participation essential.

Among the results of the gross ignorance in matters of design on the part of Mayors and Assistant Mayors is that more than ten of them have served time in prison. Ehud Olmert who later became Prime Minister didn’t understand that those gargantuan buildings at the top of the hill spelled corruption. Thousands of Holyland Parks have been constructed since, the building rights of the original in Jerusalem restored.

Neighborhood physical planning committees, the best known model in Jerusalem, are not recognized by law. Residents, who know their environment best, advised by an architect or town planner, meet in community administration facilities. Needless to say their comments and criticism, however intelligent, are entirely disregarded. But were these committees financially independent of Jerusalem municipality, they would have to be heard.
The state of urban planning in Israel continues to be extremely problematic, failing to respect our architectural heritage, human scale and context. Its rectification the difficult task of future generations whose ethical and moral standards will hopefully be on a far higher level than those of today and which make proper town planning virtually impossible.