Prague will present a proposal for the Metropolitan Plan to the public in autumn

Prague – The Prague City Hall will present a proposal for the Metropolitan Plan to the public this October or November, addressing the submitted comments. The schedule for the further steps in its creation will be completed this February. Petr Hlaváček (TOP 09), the deputy mayor, told ČTK in an interview today. In contrast to the current proposal for the new Metropolitan Plan, it establishes height regulations for buildings, for example. It was created for the city by the Institute of Planning and Development (IPR). It is set to take effect from January 1, 2023. The current plan was approved in 1999.

Both residents and individual municipal offices or affected authorities could submit comments on the proposal for the Metropolitan Plan. "In March, we should have a presentation for the districts regarding the nature of that addressing. And sometime around October or November, we should present the plan after addressing it for so-called public discussion," Hlaváček said.

The exact schedule for the preparation of the Metropolitan Plan will still be finalized and adjusted. According to the deputy mayor, it should be presented at a meeting of the city council's committee for urban development this February.

According to the city’s expectations and IPR, the plan was supposed to take effect at the beginning of 2023. This deadline will likely not be met. The discussion on the plan was complicated by, for example, the coronavirus pandemic. "I expect that the delay will not be drastically long. We are currently working on that schedule,” Hlaváček said.

The plan is one of the documents that determines construction in Prague. Unlike the current zoning plan, the metropolitan plan addresses height regulations, for example. It also does not only take into account the functional use of the area, but also considers the character of the area and the city district, such as how it looks. It is not just about monofunctional areas, but there is an emphasis on the structure of the city.

There have been disputes around the new plan in the past, which among other things led to the temporary departure of its main author, architect Roman Koucký. Ultimately, he returned to head the team preparing the plan after winning a selection process. However, the preparation has fallen behind schedule. It was originally supposed to take effect as early as 2020, but the Chamber of Deputies extended the deadline by three years. The preparation of the plan began during the administration of Mayor Tomáš Hudeček (independent, then TOP 09).