“Always plan ahead. It wasn't raining when Noah built the ark”
– Richard C Cushing, 1895-1970

The planning and control of the construction, growth, and development of a city or town - that is your dictionary definition of town planning. Every city in the world starts out with the best of intentions, but sometimes get distracted by various other considerations along the way. A lot of talk is going on about how the cities should have been planned better with due consideration given to the wadis, but as one of the gentlemen involved in town planning pointed out: ‘If you confine yourself to such parameters, there won't be much scope for development. By that count you cannot have any development in Salalah.... We just have to make sure that we plan our cities after sufficient research.’ And that is the key: research.

What we found in the course of doing our cover story, is that unbeleivable amount of information is available within the system. The knowledge base inherent in the various stakeholders of the infrastructure-building process, technological advancements, all mean one thing: we have no excuse not to do it right.

There were proposals to build a multi-storeyed commercial complex in Qurm with parking facilities to be constructed on columns in the wadi. There will always be a consultant you can find to proclaim a project feasible, but the fact is that the increase in risk for both upstream and downstream areas renders such a proposal immediately unviable. This was turned down. The Qurm beach road as it exists, blocks the natural flow of water from the mountains to the sea, but this was one of those proposals that went ahead.

You win some, you lose some. Often, when there is not enough collaboration between various arms of a body, lack of information may cause the wrong decision to be taken. A quick decision is always welcome, but not a hasty one. Another big issue is that when it comes to infrastructure, you are talking about construction that you expect will last a long time. Cheapest in these cases may mean compromises that should have never been made. Guidelines exist - all that remains is to understand its import and bide by them.


Mohana Prabhakar
Managing editor