Open Space Bonus for Bengaluru City

When there is little "free" land available in Bangalore urban and peripheral areas, how do you encourage creation of public space? Large parks and lung spaces is one thing, 'small' public spaces another. Think a little extra width for pedestrians. Think extra bus bays on private spaces. May be some lawn space and plazas along the high density roads to reduce the action on the shores of the "corridors".

Looking around at 40-50 year planning history of large and dense cities like London and New York, I found something interesting - a bonus for private builders to create small open spaces. The "plaza bonus" was part of the zoning laws passed in New York in 1961. It allowed developers to build taller structures in exchange for creating and maintaining plazas, atriums, passageways, and other spaces, all open to the public. Simply speaking, set aside some land in your plot as public space, and get higher FAR as "bonus":

"The Plaza Bonus is an incentive for developers to provide the public with accessible open areas around their buildings. such plazas presumably increase pedestrian space in densely built-up areas and sun and sky in areas with tall buildings. In compensation for this public benefit, developers receive a bonus of additional rentable floor area ... This bonus proved embarassingly successful. Between 1961 and 1973 1.1 mill sqft of new open space was created ... in lower manhattan, with its narrow streets and busy sidewalks, the plaza bonus produced miraculous results ..."

The Bangalore Masterplan land use regulations provide you tables that let you know the ways to maximize on construction inside your plot. Ground coverage (footprint of building as percentage of land plot area) and setback from road are some aspects there. What if there was an open space bonus to minimize your ground coverage? Would we benefit with such an initiative on the lines of New York City's plaza bonus?

-Pranav aka silkboard

PS: Let me take the time to summarize Land Use Zonal Regulations in Bengaluru Masterplan. They go like this. They read the city's charecteristics to identify types of "Areas" ( 5 types - Old urban, Urban Redevelopment, Residential, Industrial/activity, Green). Then, each of these 5 "Areas" have different "zones" under them, and norms have been listed for each zone depending on the type of use the "zone" is being or expected to be put to. For Example Urban Redevelopment area has very specific zones as MG Road, CBD, as well as all radial corridors clubbed under a zone called "mutation corridors".

Anyway. The point is about the way the norms have been prescribed for these zones. Lets take the MG Road zone.Master plan strategies for this zone are:

• Encourage continuous buildings in the defined zone for a street edge and consistent skyline.
• Promote high quality developments on larger parcels through enhanced development rights and permission for land re-constitution.
• Use of planning/management techniques and incentives for encouraging street related activity.

How would you acheive the point #3 above? Masterplan has simple indicative tables, which will suggest Grond coverage (footprint of building on the plot), setback (distance of building from from the road) and FAR (Floor Area Ratio - builtup area to plot size ratio) depending on:

• plot size
• height of the building
• type of development (commercial or residential)

If you are building on 1000 sq meter plot, and building height is 15 meters, roughly speaking:

• You can build 2500 sq meters
• Max ground coverage can be 60%
• Building must be 3 meters away from the road

Thanks for reading.

References:

1. The quote and photo from "The American City: What Works, What Doesn't" By Alexander Garvin (link)
2. Info on Land use regulation zones sourced from Masterplan LUZR pdf on BDA website