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[Article] Angry Rome fights illegal buildings with satellite

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  • 21-09-2003 7:48pm
    #1
    Victor
    Registered Users Posts: 78,387 ✭✭✭✭


    I wonder what we would find if we did the same in this country?
    Angry Rome fights illegal buildings with satellite
    From:Reuters
    Sunday, 21st September, 2003
    By Shasta Darlington

    ROME (Reuters) - Armed with a satellite and a specialised police force, Rome is stepping up a war on illegal buildings crowding ancient ruins before a nationwide amnesty lets abusive builders off the hook.

    "Starting this week, we're going to survey the city from satellite so we can spot and destroy the illegal houses ahead of the amnesty," Giancarlo D'Alessandro, Rome's head of public works, told Reuters on Sunday.

    More than 20,000 illegal constructions have gone up in protected areas around Roman temples, ancient villas and the city's sprawling urban parks, environmentalists say.

    Stultifying bureaucracy and lack of manpower have made it difficult to get rid of them. But last week Rome's centre-left government contracted a satellite company and empowered 100 police to eliminate eye-sores before they are legalised.

    Desperate for extra cash to cover a widening budget deficit, Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi has announced plans to turn a blind eye to years of unlicensed development and allow builders to legalise their work by paying a fee.

    "We need to find one to 1.5 billion euros (1 billion pounds) and we can't do it without the amnesty," Berlusconi said last weekend.

    Some estimate that the government could raise up to 4.5 billion euros from the plan, which will be part of the budget, due to be presented in a Cabinet meeting on Friday.

    The exact terms of the amnesty and size of the fees must still be worked out, but in the past such moves have legalised concrete-block hotels overlooking ancient Greek ruins and flimsy offices and apartments thrown up by the Mafia in Italy's south.

    HELPING THE SNEAKS

    In Rome alone, environmentalists estimate that 9,000 hectares of land have been built on illegally.

    "I hope that the amnesty will not be implemented because it will favour the sneaky ones and harm law-abiding citizens," Rome Mayor Walter Veltroni told journalists on Saturday. "The very mention of it has sparked new constructions."

    Veltroni already flexed his muscles last Friday, swooping in on an illegal villa with bulldozers and earthmovers just hours after it was discovered -- a record time.

    The house, hidden by camouflage fences and olive groves, had been built in the middle of the Appia Antia archaeological site, just a short stroll from one of its most famous landmarks, the huge Cecilia Metella tomb from the late Roman empire.

    Berlusconi's planned amnesty has also angered other city governments and environmentalists, who recall previous building amnesties ushered in under Berlusconi's stewardship in 1994.

    According to Legambiente, Italy's leading environmental group, there are more than 325,000 illegally constructed buildings in Italy. Last year alone, an estimated 30,000 new clandestine buildings went up.

    "Rome did the right thing. With (Berlusconi) giving in to illegal builders, Rome has sent the opposite message -- this won't be tolerated," said Legambiente's Edoardo Zanchini.


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