Abstract
TSPA, together with Vocação Técnica Lda, developed the Urban Structural Plans for Mozambique, a document and territorial management instrument designed to support Alto Molocue, Boane, Gurue, Nhamatanda, and Milange cities to orient their development and physical and socio-economic growth. Started in 2018 and finished in 2019 as a commission from MITADER, the Mozambican Ministry of Land, Environment and Rural Development, the project establishes conditions for improving local communities' lives and promotes areas with basic infrastructures and ensures economic benefits in a context of rapid demographic growth and scarce institutional control on regulated land ownership. The project responded to the institutional decentralization Mozambique undertook in 2014, therefore, the guiding document aims for its reproducibility in other Mozambican cities. Our consortium accompanied the delivered plans with a capacity-building effort to support the local authorities in implementing the same strategies in different similar contexts. The plans follow densification principles, adaptation to climate change, and the development of livable neighborhoods. The Urban Structural Plans project pioneers in community involvement and participatory data gathering. Its approach proposes to put citizens and municipal authorities at the center of the design decisions by considering them both sources and decision-makers for the urban plans. This participatory process then transformed into a capacity-building effort, so the project delivered plans and the pathway to implementing them tangibly. Structural plans is a project that started in the framework of UN-Habitat Rapid Planning Studio, fuelled by the UN’s SDG’s and the New Urban Agenda, both initiatives aim to directly target sustainable development. Some of the specific proposed actions were the pattern distribution for agricultural areas, density of urbanization, water supply, wastewater drainage and treatment, environmental and landscape treatment, urban mobility, Urban Environmental Management Plans, and management of areas susceptible to erosion and flooding. The project developed a vision for the city together with municipal authorities and local citizens through questionnaires, public audiences and collaborative planning workshop; it identified geospatial data to then analyse and design planning tools with the local inhabitants. The approach was to make use of citizens' knowledge as a source and we made sure to equip stakeholders with the right tools to effectively respond to future challenges. We supported the legislation that the Mozambican authorities approved for urban settlement planning in 2007, after more than thirty years of national independence, this framework and the uneven growth of human settlements made it urgent to provide public decision-makers, scholars, and those responsible for territorial planning with appropriate instruments and information. Our project produced the first planning exercises derived from the new legislation in a context of rapid demographic growth and scarce institutional control on regulated land ownership. The efforts targeted city design through inclusive planning, working in a back-and-forth process with citizens, gathering knowledge and opinions. The proposal also provided safety, inclusion, and sustainability guidelines to promote a sustainable exploration of potential territorial vocation. The guiding document aimed to create conditions for the emergence and implementation of new economic activities and new population agglomerates, optimize investment, and safeguard the current ecological interests. Some of the specific actions delineated in the Structural Plans are a pattern distribution for agricultural areas, the density of urbanization, water supply, wastewater drainage and treatment, riverfronts, environmental and landscape treatment, urban mobility, Urban Environmental Management Plans, management of areas susceptible to erosion and flooding.
