Planned development of prime lands in Colombo through PPP

We must commend the Government and the Defence Ministry in particular for embarking on a challenging project to relocate 60,000-70,000 housing units in underserved settlements occupying prime land in the City of Colombo. At present the relocation is done in an ad hoc manner wherever small extents of land are available. Many foreign investors have shown interest to participate in this programme.

Chamber of Construction Industry President Deshabandu Surath Wickramasinghe

The more desirable solution is to create at least seven to eight land parcels each around 50 acres in extent in and around Colombo City to relocate the target number of families in a comprehensively planned manner in the form of neighbourhoods. These would be self-contained with modern infrastructure facilities, access to education, recreation, leisure, social and cultural activities.

This way we could transform the community living in these housing units with a better quality of life and to be citizens with equal opportunities to compete with others. These neighbourhoods should also be linked to an efficient transport network that will speedily provide the residents with communication to reach the city and other important locations.

The objection to the neighbourhood concept will be to say that there is no land available in and around the city to comply with this proposal. The challenge is to find the land using alternative strategies, such as utilising underused government and private properties, land swapping with the private sector, building above low-lying areas, etc. We are confident that the land could be found.

If the neighbourhood concept is accepted the implementation strategy is to offer foreign/local investors looking for projects in Sri Lanka the neighbourhoods described above to relocate the families from the identified prime land currently occupied by underserved settlements. The investor will be given the liberated prime land as collateral for the investment, after valuation of the land prior to relocation.

In the relocation process the cost of construction, will inherently include a reasonable interest. The allocation of prime land will be equivalent to the value of the cost of construction. Thereafter, when the development takes place in the liberated land, the profit is 100% to the developer.  This Public-Private-Partnership model which is being supported by the Ministry of Defence, we think is a way forward and a viable proposition.

The liberated land in the City of Colombo after the relocation will be more than 1,000 acres and will pave the way to design a world class city with integrated state-of-the-art infrastructure to attract leading investors/developers to be competitive with countries like Singapore.

This would trigger foreign and local businesses and all other services to flourish and develop the city to promote global business. This concept has to be supported by a financial and business hub, entertainment/shopping, culture/arts/exhibitions and festivals, knowledge city with multimedia technology, greenery/open spaces/playgrounds and modern/smart housing.