National plan is most welcome
Because the Virgin Islands can ill afford to continue developing in a haphazard manner, we are pleased that the Town and Country Planning Department is again working toward a National Development Plan.
This initiative, which is provided for in the 2004 Physical Planning Act, has been a long time in coming. In 2008, the TCPD announced at a public meeting that it would move forward with the effort, but the agency apparently got sidetracked.
Now, government leaders and the wider community should work with the department to ensure that the plan comes to fruition as soon as possible.
Time is of the essence, after all. As the territory’s population has nearly tripled in the past three decades, the pressures of growth have increased tremendously. Gone are the days when development was so infrequent and unobtrusive that it caused few concerns.
Today, Road Town is perhaps the most visible example of wasted opportunity. In the absence of proper planning, the city has become a congested thoroughfare, most of which is neither pedestrian friendly nor particularly pleasant.
This is not for want of ideas: Many sound recommendations have been ignored. The 2007 Road Town Improvement Project report, for example, suggested various steps that would help improve the capital for residents and tourists alike: constructing a walkway along the waterfront; closing Main Street to vehicular traffic; instituting better public transportation; and building park-and-ride facilities at the edges of town, to name a few.
But such initiatives take the sort of long-term planning that has been lacking in the VI. And too often, well-meaning reform efforts have been thwarted by political interference.
Fortunately, it is not too late. A National Development Plan that maps the way forward will be a major step in the right direction.
Granted, creating and enforcing the strategy will not be easy. In a territory where development typically has been regulated loosely at best, there will be strident opposition to any changes to the status quo.
Indeed, any worthwhile development strategy will necessarily mean restrictions that some will find unpalatable. But residents should remember that a National Development Plan, by definition, is for the greater good.
The TCPD hopes to present a draft to the public in the fall, with hopes of finalising a 15-year plan by 2015. All residents should weigh in and support the effort however they can.
For too long in the Virgin Islands, prudent planning has been subordinated to politics and the whims of a few. Systemic change is needed now.
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