Building Permit Approval System A Case Study of Kirtipur Municipality

Abstract

In Nepal, the level of building code implementation is different in different municipalities and each municipality has a different building permit process. No research is done about the effectiveness of the building permit approval system in the local authority in Nepal. The study was conducted to review the effectiveness of the building permit approval system in Kirtipur Municipality. The research presents and discusses the findings from one of the methods used to measure effectiveness of the system. Fifty (50) questionnaires have been made to the house owner or the Principal Submitting Person (PSP) of the private building registered on FY 2076/77 or later. Four problems were identified from literature review relevant for Kirtipur Municipality and two problems were identified from group discussion with the house owners of ward number nine of Kirtipur Municipality. Most of the respondents felt that ineffectiveness of the building plan approval process was due to lack of transparency, information gap regarding Building permit process and delay to send notice by the ward. The causes of lack of transparency were found to be deficiency of complaint mechanism, discrepancy of the basis of designer, step of floor plan approval is not disclosed and delay in decision. The causes of the problem with the information gap regarding building permit process were building permit procedures not accessible via phone, responsible officials are not friendly to give information and building permit procedures not accessible via website. The problem of delay to send notice by the ward was delay to make site visits by the ward engineer, delay to send report by the ward engineer and due to reshuffling of engineers in ward offices.