Urban planning, design key to megacity success —Experts

Experts have called for the development of a Lagos megacity that is based on adequate planning and driven by professional expertise.

This was made recently by professionals in the nation’s architectural industry, who also called on the government to ensure adequate planning in the Lagos megacity project so as to avoid the mistakes of the past.

When commenting on the need for proper planning to be given towards the megacity project, The immediate past Chairman of the Nigerian Institute of Architects (NIA), Lagos State branch, Arc. Ladipo Lewis, noted that Lagos as a megacity could not achieve a true megacity status without appropriate architecture and urban design. He therefore called for appropriate legislations to aid the development of the Lagos megacity project.

“All over the world, legislation affects the value of land and the incentive to invest in it. We need to create an enabling environment for opportunities in the development of real estate for everyone, no matter their economic status. This in turn will create a vibrant economy and provide jobs across various professions,” he noted.

According to the ex-National President of NIA, Arc Ibrahim Haruna, planning in a city as densely as Lagos is indispensable and it serves as the link between huge investments especially since the 70’s, and the sprawls of peripheries, shapelessness of the intervening spaces and decay of most Nigerian.

In his own opinion, President of First World Communications, Brig Gen P.M.O. Reis (rtd), stated that all professionals were saddled with the responsibility of driving urban development, and that there could not have been a better time to have a concerted effort than now in the view of the challenges of globalization, climate change, Urban sprawl and economic recession.