Master Zoning Plan Lifts the 50-Year Building Freeze in Tartous Seafront

On April 24, the Minister of Public Works and Housing approved amendments to the master zoning plan for the city of Tartous, which includes changes to the eastern facade of the coastal corniche, known as the Tartous Seafront, under Decision No. 3202.

The amendments specify that the seafront will be divided into 45 zoning plots. Property owners can now review at the city council detailed plans, which include permissible building areas, the number of floors, and setbacks (distance between properties). According to the amendments, building permits can now be obtained from the city council for these zoning plots, ending a 50-year building freeze in the area. Property owners are also allowed to renovate their homes, despite the city council’s recommendation to demolish and rebuild them due to their dilapidated and old condition.

The seafront of Tartous is approximately 1,400 metres long and varies in width from 30 to 130 metres. It is currently occupied by small, old, dilapidated houses, home to about 15,000 people. Most houses in the area are single-storey and have many inheritors. The large number of rights holders in the seafront area, who own shares in scattered small properties, has made it resemble a collectively owned informal settlement that cannot be redeveloped without rezoning. Therefore, in 1976, the city council issued a decision to halt the issuance of building or renovation permits in the area, pending the release of the city’s new master plan.

Since then, a back and forth between authorities concerning  the number and size of the zoning plots designated for construction has added a layer of intricacy. There is a complex relationship between the number of zoning plots, the size of each plot, and the number of rights holders. For example, the more plots there are, the smaller each plot becomes, and the fewer rights holders there are per plot.

The master plan for the city of Tartous, issued in 1988, set the minimum area for a single zoning plot on the seafront at 2,000 square metres. The amended master plan for the seafront, issued in 2006, revised this minimum area to 900 square metres, creating 27 plots. In 2019, Tishreen University conducted a study that increased the number of zoning plots to 80, with a minimum area of 250 square metres per plot, each potentially containing up to five properties with dozens of owners, occupants, heirs, and tenants.

The Tartous City Council adopted the study, but the Ministry of Public Works and Housing rejected it in March 2022, insisting on keeping the number of plots at 27. The fewer plots there are, the larger each plot becomes, making it more feasible to construct large buildings and provide additional built-up areas that could benefit the Ministry.

In June 2022, the city council formed a committee that proposed a compromise solution: dividing the seafront into 45 zoning plots ready for construction, with areas ranging from 800 to 1,200 square metres.

The city council accepted the committee’s proposal, which was then approved by the Minister of Housing in its decision No. 3202 on April 24.

In any case, adopting 45 zoning plots ready for construction means that each plot will have a large number of rights holders. This requires their agreement to carry out the necessary administrative and engineering procedures to obtain a building permit for their plot. This is not an easy task, given the presence of dozens of heirs for each property, some of whom are absent or have emigrated.

On June 3, the state-run Al-Baath newspaper reported that, despite two months having passed since the approval of the master plan, none of the property owners had applied for building permits in the seafront area. Mazhar Hassan, an official of the city of Tartous, told the newspaper that this was natural due to the complexities and entanglements that have arisen with these properties after 50 years of a building freeze. He added that obtaining building permits requires new agreements or understandings among the rights holders in plots that do not meet the area requirements.

Even in plots that meet the area requirements and are free from inheritance entanglements, construction remains dependent on the financial capability of the owners, due to the high costs of building materials and labour, according to Mr Hassan. Al-Baaath added that the solution is for companies to undertake this type of construction and investment, as building properties on the 45 plots is not feasible relying on family or individual capabilities.