On Thursday, September 26, the Buenos Aires Legislature approved on first reading the changes to the Urban Planning Code (CUr) of the City. After a month and a half of debate in the committees, the official proposal It arrived at the venue with some modifications.
The structural reform introduced by Law 6099/18 has been highly criticized for lacking consensus and attacking neighborhood identity. Now, a change of scenario opens an opportunity: “There is a first total agreement that the Code could be improved. Jorge Macri took up the issue during the campaign and committed to doing so,” says Álvaro García Resta.
In an interview with ARQ, the Secretary of Urban Development highlights that “no political force has the majority to remove the Code as it came in.” Then, the legislative discussion takes on substance.
“My team was working in the Legislature, reviewing planchette by planchette with the advisors from all political spaces”, he highlights. For García Resta “there is no room for unconstructive discussion, now you propose and expose yourself, or you accept,” he challenges.
He anticipates that “It’s going to be a great urban agreement” and offers a title: “This code is not going to be someone’s code, it is going to be everyone’s because it is going to come out with political consensus.”
What is the main objective of the official project? “Laws have a body, what is written, and a spirit, what they want to achieve. The spirit of this law is the balance. “It does not concede everything on one side or everything on the other. Therefore, it is logical that there is ‘noise’ on both sides.”
The official project for the CUr “would not be a code change but an adjustment of the current” which points to delve into three aspects: the identity of the neighborhoods and reconstruction of the lung of the block, the preservation of heritage and the development of the southern area.
“Regarding the neighborhood identity We aim at the future reconstruction of the apple lung,” he points out. To achieve this, USAB 1 and 2 will not be able to reach the internal basement line but rather the internal front line, thus recovering absorbent land in the block.
In turn, the damage that is to be prevented is the appearance of buildings of five levels (the USAB 2, which are generally the meridian lots of the block) dotted on the blocks of low houses.
The reform would ensure that the land on the cornerwhere the internal front line and the basement line meet, have equal attractive for investors and that the apples grow together, in the shortest possible time.
Besides, USAB 0 is created with a maximum height of 9 meters. The official plan proposed that they be without balconies (because they are usually located on streets with narrow sidewalks, the projections would affect the urban trees), but it was rejected. In the three USAB no withdrawal required.
Another factor that affects neighborhoods is the saturation of uses. For García Resta, “the challenge of legislative activity is to find an instrument against saturation.”
When is it too much? “Palermo is obviously saturated in terms of infrastructure. People enjoy it a lot but some who live there suffer from it. The saturation of uses is bad but not that the mixture exists“, defines the official.
Another of the axes of the project is deepen incentives for development of the southern area reversing the direction of the transfer of construction, that is, from south to north.
“The south is a third of the City that is not developed. Today there is a phenomenon that is negative capital gain“The construction cost is worth more than the sales value per m2,” he compares.
Why grant m2 in the northern zone to those who invest in the south? “So that the southern project is viable. In the previous code, the idea of emission and reception, in reverse, was proposed, but it did not work,” he says.
In turn, the heritage propertiesin any neighborhood of the city, are also proposed as constructivity emitters.
But first, it is planned to resolve the preventive cataloging of 4,209 properties: “From now on, what is heritage will be by law, so that it is clear and avoid consulting the Advisory Council on Heritage Affairs in each case.”
Protected buildings would be “constructive emitters” to make their conservation sustainable.García Resta highlights that the law cannot force the owner of an asset of patrimonial value to maintain it but must offer him incentives to do so.
“The difference between the meters that he could have made and the ones he has is allowed to be issued. And in that way become funds to sustain assets -explains-. So, if in 10 years you demonstrate that you maintained the property, you will be given the issuance of meters again.”
That way, private parties could keep assets protected. “That the regulations themselves be the one that generates the incentives for make it a business to buy assets”, highlights García Resta.
“I see some good signs in the discussions that are taking place, they are the ones we wanted to provoke. We did not want to say which is the correct city. What we did was value the necessary discussion: that the heritage is sustainable, that the city has been balanced and that, for that to happen, we must create the instruments,” he summarizes, emphasizing again that “today the construction of the law is between everyone”.
Currently, the CUr has a transfer instrument, but the legislative debate will focus on fine-tuning it. The deputies will have to agree on what percentage the transfer of meters from south to northwhich polygons will be the emitters and which will be the receivers of m2.
”What is the worst scenario? that the southern zone does not develop because we do not reach an agreement. That’s why it’s very important for me to be part of it, not just watch from the outside.”
“You have an area in the north of the city developed or with a lot of strength and a southern area, zero. If you understand why this asymmetry, you can redistribute it, compensate. Obviously until it starts, then the south will be able to continue developing on its own”García Resta insists.
Regarding the uncertainty generated by the short periodicity of changes and twists and turns of the law, the official concedes: “After this adjustment, one could think of 10 years or more”.
And he calls again: “Transform the bill into law It will be with a really broad discussion and generating agreements. Because the coming CUr is going to be a great urban agreement. All opinion-makers are no longer passive; questioning without proposing is inappropriate.”