An Explainer: Master Plan

A master plan is a planning document by local urban governments to guide the economic development of a city.

PropGuide Explains Master PlanMaster plan of a city is a comprehensive plan to guide the future development of the city. For instance, before building water mains, a city's master plan would develop a long-term plan to modernise water systems. The master plan forms the foundation for government planning of the city.

Economic development of cities have much to do with intelligent master planning. For instance, the grid plan of New York City was proposed in the commissioner's plan of 1811. This led to the creation of modern Manhattan, allowing the city to have infrastructure that supports its growing population.

Some economists have recently been arguing that preparing master plans for cities is often too costly, and do not usually pass the cost-benefit test. As we now have applications like Google Earth, economists think that we can collect more information about land usage pattern. Master plans rarely utilise such applications but ISRO's Bhuvan application is expected to map Indian cities to facilitate the Smart City Mission of the NDA government. The Indian government recently approved a proposed master plan to build 50 solar cities across the country.

PropTiger.com recently developed, City Master Plan, a feature that displays the future development of a city on its current map, collecting information from master plan documents of cities.

Check out PropGuide's comprehensive guide to real estate terms here.

Blogs Related To Master PlanZoom Into The Future Of Your City with 'City Master Plan'