CAIRO - When the new towns of 6th October, 10 Ramadan and Sadat were designed in the late l970s, there was a vision to surround these emerging cities with a green belt. The plan has however remained a mere thought that never materialised, although the Urban Communities Authority did embark in 1992 upon a green belt in the case of 6 October. Green belts are known all over the world as preserving undeveloped, wild or agricultural areas that surround towns. As for the 6th of October City, l7 kilometres from the Giza Pyramids, the green belt originally targeted the reclamation of around l7,000 to 2l,000 feddans (Acress) stretching from the Cairo-Alexandria Desert Road to the Baharia Oases High Road, to serve as a green lung for the fast-growing town. October City, a 97,000 feddans area, proved to be one of the most attractive towns in terms of population growth. The presence of an industrial zone and private educational institutions helped promote the city and encouraged young couples to move there. The green belt was divided into five major parts, adjacent to main and subsidiary roads where public utilities like water, electricity and irrigation facilities were provided to encourage land buyers to transform desert land into green areas. According to the green belt's construction code, buildings were supposed to account for only three per cent of the total area and each feddan (4200 metres) was to have a residence no bigger than l20 square metres. What happened on the ground, as observers say, was totally different from the plans. High rises mushroomed, exceeding construction limits specified by the Urban Communities Authority. According to Megahed Radwan, a real estate developer, the green belt area was in high demand before the January revolution. Prices, he said, started from LE60,000 per feddan and went up to around LE500,000, depending on the location. “But the green areas are so small compared to the built ones”, Radwan told Al-Masry Al-Youm independent daily. Experts say, however, that technical problems, like pumping water from a depth of 70 metres, are behind the tendency to build rather than cultivate. Sayed Habashi, Head of the Arab Federation for Real Estate Funding and Assessment, explained that the water problem had made the former government amend the percentage of construction to seven per cent. In his opinion the green belt idea was promising, but a proper decision needed to be taken whether to turn it into a residential area or retain its original agricultural nature. He argued that an urgent study was needed to determine the area's reclamation feasibility. In any case, he said, if construction in the green belt was to go ahead, it required clear classification. There had to be proper compounds rather than a random expansion of cement blocks. Habashi regretted the lack of relevant studies and urged landowners not to sell their plots until the picture was clearer. He pointed out that the real estate market was currently in a state of anticipation, and that the green belt in the 6th October area was no exception, as purchase prices had dropped dramatically in the wake of the revolution.
