Olomoučany are most troubled by transport and housing

Olomouc - Transport and the associated noise burden, housing, public green spaces, and flood prevention measures. These are the topics that most frequently arise in the comments on the proposed terms of reference for the urban plan of the city of Olomouc. Citizens have been able to submit their comments since October and still have a few days left to do so.
    So far, several dozen written comments have been collected at the Department of Concept and Development of the Olomouc City Hall. "There are about fifty, but this number is imprecise because some comments are signed by more than a hundred citizens, while others by the same person who has submitted several different comments," said Hana Galíková from the Department of Concept and Development, who is responsible for recording comments.
    Some of the requests are already included in the proposed terms of reference, while others will be forwarded by the Department of Concept and Development to the developer of the new urban plan. This will emerge from a tender process next year, and it will have to deal with several real challenges. It will not be able to satisfy all requests, as they are already in many cases completely contradictory. For example, consider the future of the Olomouc airport in Neředín. While some are calling for the airport to be modernized so that it can serve domestic transport, others want the airport to be completely closed due to its unsuitable location near residential areas. "In the preparation of the new urban plan, the issues surrounding the airport in Olomouc will be one of the most complex. For this reason, the proposal already includes a requirement for alternative solutions for the airport, and a final solution will emerge from the discussion of these alternatives in the draft stage of the urban plan, sometime in 2010," said Radek Dosoudil, head of the Department of Concept and Development. 
    Similar disputes are also evident in comments concerning housing - some residents of Olomouc are calling for new residential buildings to be constructed practically wherever possible, while others disagree with the densification of buildings at the expense of relaxation and rest spaces. A significant problem that the city will need to address in preparing the urban plan will be high-rise buildings. This topic has also appeared among the comments submitted by Olomouc citizens to the Department of Concept and Development. While most city residents have concerns about high-rise buildings and the potential disruption of the city’s skyline, there has also been a suggestion to surround the city with a "belt" of high-rise buildings to preserve valuable agricultural land.
    Most frequently, however, the comments focused on the topic of transport. In addition to the already mentioned future of the airport, citizens of Olomouc point to parking problems and even propose specific solutions for individual locations. "We will pass these requests to the developers of the urban plan for their review. Some of them are already included in the proposed terms of reference, while others may serve as inspiration and a starting point for the developers," noted Dosoudil. However, the topic of transport is far from being exhausted by requests for solutions to individual parking lots and intersections. Olomouc citizens also suggested improvements to the sidewalk network, cycling paths, and tram lines, and even proposed the introduction of trolleybus transport in the city.
    Landowners frequently request the inclusion of specific parcels in the category of building plots. Most of them wish to build family houses, while others, for instance, want gardens and recreational areas. Requests for the establishment of recreational and rest zones, the revitalization of urban greenery, and the protection of agricultural land also appear relatively often in the comments.
    One hundred residents of Chomoutov submitted a single comment - they disagree with the proposal to protect Chomoutov with a flood protection system and demand the cleaning of the Morava River bed, the unblocking of a buried drainage channel to the former sand pit, solutions for flood protection using concrete levees around the Morava River, and increasing the throughput of the small hydroelectric power station Moskava. "We will record and evaluate all comments. The evaluation should be completed by the turn of January and February next year. Based on the submitted comments, requests, and suggestions, we will then adjust the proposed terms of reference and present it for approval to the City Council of Olomouc," added Dosoudil.
    The city hall will not respond individually to the comments, but their evaluation will be published together with the adjusted proposal for the terms of reference on the official notice board and on the city’s website. All comments will also be published in scanned form.
    The deadline for submitting comments on the proposed terms of reference for the urban plan has been extended more than twice - by law, this deadline must be at least one month; Olomouc citizens had time reserved since October, and the submission option ends on December 31, 2008.
    For those who still want to take the opportunity to submit a comment on the proposed terms of reference for the urban plan, forms are available where it is enough to write the content of the comment, fill in contact details, and sign. Interested parties can find the forms on the website www.olomouc.eu/uzemni-planovani, at the information center in the city hall arcade, or at the Department of Concept and Development in the city hall building on Hynaisova Street.  
Completed forms should be sent to the address: City Hall of Olomouc, Department of Concept and Development, Hynaisova 10, 779 11 Olomouc.