Calcalist, Amitay Gazit, 26.04.2021
Bat Yam is promoting a plan to build a new business district in the southwest of the city, which will include the potential for building 2 million square meters of offices and another 9,000 apartments. The policy document will be submitted today to the Tel Aviv District Committee and is expected to adopt its principles.
Since this is not an outline plan that needs to go through a statutory procedure, the document that defines the planning principles in the borough is not binding. The goal is to create a new district from which the property tax revenues will improve the economic situation of Bat Yam, and from a planning point of view there will be a link between the parts of the city.
The new policy is necessary for the city not only for planning reasons, but especially for economic reasons. The meager construction reserves in the crowded city did not allow it to develop enough offices and its budget deficit deepened year by year.
Today, the city has a population of 157,000 and within a decade another 60,000 will be added to it after the establishment of a new neighborhood in the southwest. This is while only about 35% of Bat Yam's property tax revenues today come from businesses, compared to Tel Aviv where businesses constitute 75% of property tax revenues.
This situation, and years of mismanagement, led the municipality to a perpetual deficit. In 2019, for example, it had a deficit of NIS 28 million. In that year, its cumulative deficit reached NIS 110 million. Over the past decade, three committees have examined solutions for Bat Yam, and in June 2017 a recommendation was published to unite it with Tel Aviv, but Interior Minister Aryeh Deri was quick to announce that the decision will wait for the 2023 elections and so far there are no signs that this complex process is progressing.
The flood of offices
The plan to build 2 million square meters of offices that will pay property taxes is very promising "on paper", but given the flooding of the office market, the massive construction expected in the entire Gush Dan and the corona that changed the expected demand, it is not certain that the municipality will harvest so quickly, if at all.
The new policy document was born after Shabbat Yam failed to validate a master plan for a business district it began promoting a decade ago.
According to the new policy document, the district covers 760 dunams and currently houses mainly old and neglected industrial buildings of one or two storeys, and the total built-up area is 340,000 square meters. It has only 460 apartments, most of them smaller than 75 square meters. And are not suitable for families with children. More than half of its 806 residents are over 65 years old.
This new policy document is based on the policy of the Tel Aviv District Committee, according to which a 26-40-story tower can be built in the business district of the Tel Aviv district near the mass transit arteries.
20% small apartments
In accordance with this policy, the area of the quarter is divided into three complexes: the eastern one along Nissenbaum Street stipulates that in plots of 4 dunams or less, construction will be allowed to a distance of 6 sq.m. (floor parts of land, ie In the event that landowners manage to join together and create one plot larger than 4 dunams, they will be able to receive rights amounting to 9 sq.m. % Of the total built-up area in the plan.
In the heart of the district - between Cinnamon and ORT Israel streets and another enclave in the southwest corner - a distance of 6-4 will be possible depending on the size of the plot. The proportion of apartments will be 30% -40% of the built-up area.
Bat Yam Mayor Zvika Brut
( Photo: Kobi Cuenx )
The third complex is a small rectangle in the west of the quarter in front of Gan Ha'ir and Yitzhak Sadeh Street, which borders residential buildings, so it was decided that the construction volumes in it will be relatively small - up to 4%, 35% of the built-up area in each plan. Increase the living space to 50% of the total built-up area.
If the full potential of the plan is realized, about 2 million square meters of offices and commercial space and 9,000 apartments with a built-up area of one million square meters will be built in the district and 26,000 people are expected to live there. According to the principles of the plan, about 20% of the new apartments will be small with a built-up area of up to 65 square meters. Due to the proximity to the light rail line, the parking standard is limited and will be 0.6 parking spaces per apartment.
According to the Bat Yam Municipality, the capacity of the public areas that currently exist in the district will allow the establishment of educational institutions that are sufficient for only 6,000 apartments. Therefore, the realization of all the potential of the program will require an addition of 14 acres to educational institutions. To solve this, one of the conditions for obtaining residential building rights requires the developer to allocate to the municipality areas for the benefit of public buildings.