MASTER PLAN

In Barron’s Real Estate Dictionary (2003), Master plan is defined as a document that describes, in narrative and with maps, an overall development concept. According to Glagola (2002), the master plan provides a framework for the physical environment that incorporates the buildings. Master planning develops the site-specific integration of programmed elements, natural conditions and constructed infrastructure and systems at the functional, aesthetic and temporal levels. The nature of the plan will influence, and be influenced by, the context of the project location beyond the property lines. A functional master plan should be in alignment with community needs and expectations.

The development of a master plan starts with alternative organisational configurations, often referred to as scenarios, to accommodate the needs that are identified in the strategic facility plan. These scenarios or alternatives represent differing priorities and criteria, and present choices for organisational and site/facility models. The master planning process is best accomplished with input from a number of experts and stakeholders. Components of a master plan include: regulatory analysis; infrastructure and transportation planning; amenities and support plan; corporate image; security strategies; phasing plans; cost projections; and environmental design. Expert planners need to ensure the outcome is achievable, yet flexible enough to preserve future options (Glagola, op cit).

The master plan is used to coordinate the preparation of more detailed plans, or may be a collection of detailed plans. Generally speaking, a master plan could be described as: 

• The comprehensive development plan of a city is also called ‘master plan’ or ‘general plan’ or ‘city plan’. The plan serves as an effective tool or instrument to achieve the desirable goals and objective regarding physical development. The comprehensive plan is a means to an end, it is not an end in itself, i.e. it is a tool used to attain a certain level of development.
• A city plan or the master plan is a long range plan which usually span through 20-30 years and it is meant to guide the overall physical development of a city. The city plan is a rational way of guiding the social, economic, political and physical activities within an urban area.
• It is also a long term policy for spatial distribution of objects, functions, activities and goals. A comprehensive plan is used to coordinate government activities and to regulate private development of land.
• The comprehensive plan is a means to an end, it is not an end in itself, i.e. it is a tool used to attain a certain level of development.

Goals and objectives of a master or comprehensive plan

The master plan is essentially a policy instrument that provides the basis for accomplishing certain aims and objectives, and to satisfy the aspiration of a developing community. More specifically, the plan should aim at:

• Creating a total environment – that is, efficient, healthful and aesthetically satisfying as a setting for human activities.
• Promoting the larger interest of the community as a whole
• Serving a policy framework to fulfil the needs and aspirations of the community concerned.
• Effecting coordination between physical, economic, socio-cultural and political forces that govern the structure of the community and the technical means to regulate it.
• Formulating long- range and short-range action programmes with view to injecting long-term considerations into short-term actions

The need for a master plan

A human settlement is a living organism, which has an origin, growth, decay and re-growth. It is a dynamic entity, rather than a static phenomenon. The settlement is subject to various types of forces, physical, economic, social, administrative, which influence its form and structure. It is necessary to channel these forces in a planned manner to create the total environ which is healthy, efficient and satisfying for working, living, recreating and nourishing. The comprehensive plan is an instrument to achieve these objectives.

The scope and content of a city master plan

The city plan can be very broad covering all aspects of the city and in that case it will include development and re-development (urban renewal) of the city. In such cases, it will cover economic, social and even the cultural aspects of the city. On the other hand, it may be narrow or limited, confining itself only to those aspects which have a direct bearing on physical development such as location, size and spatial relationships.

Master plans would include varying levels of detail but usually include some or all of these space-use analyses:

1. Introduction: author, legal bases, purpose, etc.
2. Summary of recommendations: This explains what the user is expected to find or gain from the document. This actions deal with (i) economic development and (ii) direction of growth, etc.
3. Analysis this deals with the various studies that were done e.g. population analysis and also you are expected to find the economic base of the community. This enable you to determine if the community is a service oriented or production based. Also, the analysis of land both current and projected.
4. Description of social economic objective of the plang. part of the plan may be to reduce the crime rate in the residential area. This can be achieved by providing street lights in the area to curb robbery under the cover of darkness. It can also be to increase the number of industries of an area. This can be done by inducing industrialist to the area.
5. Physical development proposal – Examples are:

• Land Use – Designate the various empty lands that can be put into use in the nearest future, e.g. residential, commercial, industrial, socio-cultural, recreational, administrative and other uses.
• Utility and services g. telephone, water, schools, health centres etc. the expansion and provision of new construction of existing services.
• Proposal on circulation – Circulation here means the different modes or movement of both human and goods e.g. air, land and sea. Here, different facilities that are connected with these are considered e.g. terminals (airports, seaports) hardware and routes.
• Civic Design – This relates to the design of public buildings such as city halls, court houses, their design and location in relation to other activities and areas within the community i.e. how accessible are they from other parts of the community.
• Special problems of the community: – No two cities are similar. Therefore, cities do not have identical problems by virtue of its location, size, structure and form, each community has some special problems and unique characteristics of its own. e.g. soil erosion which may have a considerable effect on say the crop rotation which the area is noted for; loses of population at an alarming rate due to emigration. The master plan should highlight the distractive features and also suggest solutions to the special problems.
• Open Spaces – The master plan indicates the location and extent of desirable open spaces for parks, playgrounds, stadiums, gardens, cemeteries, etc.

1. Conclusion – This section deals with improvements and the various tools that will make the plan work. Examples of the implementation tools are zoning ordinances, subdivision regulations, housing codes, building bye-laws, capital improvement programmes.

The procedure for preparing a comprehensive master plan

• Organisation: Determine the organisation that will be responsible for the preparation of the comprehensive plan. There are four (4) different organisations that one can have. These are:
• Planning section of a local government – In this case, it is believed that the planning section will be better because:
• They are most familiar with the problems and potentials of their area/ community.
• It has the advantage of combining both plan making and plan implementation functions.
• Creation of the specialised planning organisation just for the preparation of the comprehensive plan – some advocate that the plan should not be prepared and also executed by the same organisation with a view to avoiding preconceived ideas and prejudices. They also fear that the local body cannot effectively resist local pressures from vested interests. They recommend that a specialized and independent planning organisation/ authority, only tenuously connected with the local government, should prepare the plan.
• Consultants to prepare the plan – many cities have neither the technical personnel nor the organisation to undertake the complex task of preparing a plan. They find it convenient to engage a consultant to prepare the plan within the broad framework of policies and guidelines determined by the concerned authority.
• Legislative approval – to get the legislative approval, the amount of staff time that will be needed will be stated and the expenses that will be incurred estimated, then the idea will be passed to the legislative for adoption.
• Preparation of a preliminary plan– Such plan will include the findings on present situation or present development as well as proposals and progress report. It will also include the goals formulated by the legislature, the views expressed by the citizens through citizen committee, a hoc committee or through public hearing.
• Preliminary plan approval –Some time, say six month or one year, is allowed for debate on the proposal put forward. The objective of the comprehensive plan will be to.
• Improve the plan
• Make it express the wishes and aspirations of the people at the legislature. Through this debate, changes may arise and new study may be required.
• The adoption of the plan by the legislature –For the plan to be approved, it has to be adopted. This adoption makes the plan :
• To be taken seriously by the legislature
• Official for other users.
• To represent legislative policies. The plan is adopted by resolution, since the plan is not legislation by itself.
• Publication and distribution – The purpose of this stage is to communicate adopted policies to the public and developers. Although the plan is finished, amendments are still possible.
• Annual review –The legislators should re-examine the plan once a year for possible amendment as policies may change, aspirations of the people may change etc. This review is necessary in order to:
• Keep the policy fresh and
• To inform new members of the legislative body. A regular time of the year should be set aside for the review.
• Major reconsideration of the plan– This stage provides overhaul of the entire plan. At this stage, there is need to undertake new survey, update forecast or projecting and re-study major alternatives. To undertake major reconsideration of the plan, the same general procedure used in preparing the original plan is followed.
• The amendment of plan at any time: The fact that; certain times have been set annually for the review of the plan, it does not mean that the plan cannot be reviewed at any other time.

Land use plan

• Delineates the areas of the city or town to be devoted for various uses like residential, commercial, industrial, public open spaces etc.
• Prescribes the allowable density standard for various land uses and it does this by making reference to population size and the building bulk i.e. the size of a building that is allowable on a building plot.
• Designates areas for multiple and single dwelling units as well as areas for recreation, conservation and agriculture.
• Establish the various neighbourhood units and it will specify the services and facilities that such neighbourhood nit will required. Such facilities and services will include schools, parks, playground, shopping centers etc.
• Relates the city with the region within which it situated with its immediate environment. This is because the land use pattern of any community will be a product of both internal and external forces within which the city that operate within the region in which the city is located.
• Defines the area and the standards for subdivisions of new lands. This is to prevent haphazard development.
• Will serve as the guide for other plans such as zoning plans or the plans for parks and recreation or the plan for schools, plans for public buildings, civic centres, etc.
• Will serve as guide for the design of utility and service such as sewers, gas, electricity, water, street lighting roads, etc.

References

Barron’s Law Dictionary master plan on Answers.com. Law Dictionary Copyright © 2003 by Barron’s Educational Series, Inc. Published by Barron’s Educational Series, Inc.

Master plan. (n.d.). Law Dictionary. Retrieved February 12, 2011, from Answers.com Web site: http://www.answers.com/topic/master-plan

Glagola, J. R.  (2002). An Introduction to strategic facilities planning: A White Paper. Real Estate Issues 27(1): 13-15. http://www.ifma.org/docs/knowledge-base/sfp_whitepaper.pdf

1. Other exceptions include: accidental or involuntary acts; deceit to obtain favour; mistakes; duress; self-defence; necessity; and incapacity – people of unsound mind; drunken persons; minors; and corporations   

In a civil action, damages may be:

• Nominal damages: Whenever there is a breach of contract but the plaintiff has suffered no loss he will be entitled to nominal damages only, i.e. the court will award him a small amount of money for the formal breach of the contract and no more.
• Substantial damages are assessed by reference to the actual loss suffered, whether physical or non-physical (such as loss or amenity) however great or small. For instance, if an act, such as slapping someone in the face, is done wilfully and publicly, it may cause greater than normal injury to his feeling and hence the damages required for compensation may be larger (“aggravated”) than the act complained of would normally justify.
• Exemplary damages: In certain circumstances, the courts will depart from the compensatory principle and permit the awarding of damages (“exemplary”, “punitive”, or “vindictive”) aimed at punishing the defendant rather of compensating the plaintiff.
• Restitution: Where a person has been deprived of his property by means of a criminal act it is only right that, if possible, he should recover it.
• Satisfaction: Can always be had by resort to a civil action and it may be affected by administrative action on the part of the police. In order to safeguard themselves against a civil claim for conversion the latter should apply for a court order under the Police (Property) Act 1897. This act provides that where property has come into the possession of the police in connection with any criminal charge Magistrate Court may order it to be the owner; and after the expiry of six months from the delivery claims to it by third parties are barred.

Causation is the relationship which exists between an act and its consequences. In civil law, it is based on the principle of foresee- ability. A man is responsible for those consequences, which he neither could nor ought to have foreseen. The chain of causation is broken by a novus actus interveniens. An exception to this rule occurs in the case of the so-called ‘egg-shell skull’ cases involving personal injury where in certain circumstances, a man may be held responsible for consequences that he could not foresee.     

• The stock of B may be issued to the owners of A rather than the corporation, with A acquiring the assets and liabilities of B and B dropping out of existence; this arrangement is referred to as a statutory merger.

Economic environment, government monetary and fiscal policies are some of the key factors which can engineer any of these business combinations. Tight monetary policy, high inflation, low rate of return etc. can compel companies into fusion. Under this situation, merger as well as the other business combinations is often considered as a means of financing growth, new areas of business opportunities and of bailing out distressed companies. Also, a financially strong company with a cash-rich balance sheet but declining future prospects and limited room for expansion can go into merger with another company with better opportunities and growth prospects, but short of cash. The mutual needs of such parties would call for business amalgamation. Merger is used to exploit additional business opportunities as a cost effective means of achieving business restructuring and assist management to effectively and efficiently organise the merged resources for the growth of the company. It is also used as a means of salvaging an ailing company from imminent collapse and liquidation.

In recording merger or the other business combinations, two methods are commonly used. One is the pooling-of-interest method, which essentially assumes that firms have pooled their resources and the books of the surviving firm are simply determined by adding together assets and liabilities of the individual firms involved.

For the pool of interest method to be used, there are 12 general conditions to be met. If they are not met, the combination is treated as a purchase. The followings capture or summarize their essence:

• There must be continuing interest in the surviving firm by all of the original stock holders that essentially parallels their interest in the firms to the mergers.
• Payment can only involve an exchange of common stock.
• The combination must be completed in one year, and part of the assets cannot be spun off for at least two years after the combination.

For firms meeting these criteria, the pooling-of-interest method simply means that their assets and liabilities are added together. Similarly the net worth of the surviving firm cannot exceed the total net worth of the firms involved in the merger. The other method is the purchase method. A purchase treats a business combination in much the same fashion as the purchase of any asset. The acquisition price is recorded at cost, and any liabilities created as a result of the acquisition are shown on the liability side of the balance sheet.

A purchase follows the accepted principles for acquiring assets. The difficulty however arises in that a number of assets are being acquired. The purchase price must therefore be allocated over a number of assets; moreover the price paid normally exceeds the book value of these assets and their fair market value. As a result, goodwill is normally generated from a purchase. The common practice is to value the tangible assets on the books of the firm at their fair market value. If the price paid exceeds the fair market value, the difference then becomes the goodwill. Another difference is that retained earnings are not carried onto the books of the acquiring firm. Only in a purchase are the liabilities created by the combination reflected on the balance sheet.

References

Olufowose, E. A. (1998). Monetary theory and investment practice in Nigeria. Ikeja, Lagos: Akins Investment Ltd.

Sprecher, C. R. (1975).  Introduction to investment management. Boston: Houghton Mifflin Company.

The World Book Encyclopaedia (1982).

William, N. K. (1987). Merger: The Encyclopaedia Americana.  Connecticut U. S. A.:  Grolier Incorporated.