Effectiveness of the "building line" in maintaining the character of streets

Abstract

When a city is growing with economic activities, city expands in numerous ways. Most common experience is shown that the preliminary ribbon development occurs along the arterials. On the other hand, the disproportionate physical development has badly affected the city surroundings Particularly the visual quality of roadsides due to encroachments, unauthorized constructions and activities. Signposts and hoardings etc. Development Regulations were introduced to control and regulate the urban development activities by Urban Development Authority. Its Law (No. 41 of 1978, and its amendments) is the general contract for regulating the urban development in Sri Lanka. In order to regulate the physical development, these regulations have been imposed to serve the intended purpose for the last 25 years. Many regulations which are being violated by the developers, the building line seems to be one of the most non-adhered to all along a particular road. It is observed that most of the buildings were constructed within the Building line. It has been affected to block and encroach the building line. The objective of the study is to assess the effectiveness of the specific regulation mentioned in the UDA law related to maintaining the “Building Line” consistent character of the streets in Sri Lankan context. This study is that the literature examines focuses attention to brief the theoretical, conceptual and legal background. The literature review of this study shows that the original purpose of the building line was to maintain a consistent character along streets. Further it explains application of building lines in Sri Lankan context. The research rationale of this study is to see how to internalize the externality of violation of planning and building regulation in particular public location. The data was collected according to the research design and compared to find out effectiveness of the “Building Line” in maintaining the characters application through an economic analysis. In order to overcome those recommendations, are put forward by this study at its end by taking both literature findings and practical applications in to account.