Tetovo expects approval of DUP for Popova Shapka; mayor says DPRS opinion secured

Tetovo municipality says a long-delayed Detailed Urban Plan (DUP) for the Popova Shapka resort area is close to moving forward after it received a positive opinion from the Directorate for Protection and Rescue. Mayor Bilal Kasami stated the obstacles that previously stalled the plan have been largely resolved and that coordination with the Ministry of Transport is already under way.

Mayor: technical approvals in place, legalization of illegal buildings will not follow

“We finally received a positive opinion from the Directorate for Protection and Rescue. We already have an agreement with the Ministry of Transport, we are in close coordination and it has been promised that if we obtain a positive opinion from the Directorate we will also receive approval from the Ministry,” Kasami said.

The DUP item was placed on the agenda at the most recent session of the Tetovo Municipal Council as "Proposal-decision for the final Proposal of the Urban Plan outside the populated place – Weekend settlement of SRC Popova Shapka," but the municipality withdrew it because approvals from higher state institutions were still pending.

A central sticking point is the existing weekend-settlement area, where construction began under a 1980s plan but where many vacation houses and other structures were built in the last two decades as unpermitted buildings. Between 2011 and 2018, the municipality received 120 legalization requests for objects in the settlement.

According to the Municipality of Tetovo’s Sector for Urbanism, 49 of those cases have been completed and implemented, while 71 remain in procedure. Most ongoing files are stalled by unresolved property-legal issues; a smaller number are in appeals before higher institutions because they did not meet conditions for legalization.

Local owners’ groups warn that if the new DUP allows further construction the settlement will expand and additional infrastructure will be necessary, including stronger power lines, greater drinking-water capacity, paved streets and parking. “Probably the Municipality plans that this will require more infrastructure, sewage, power. In winter we have greater failures of the network. The system collapses because there are many weekend houses and the power capacity is small, and so we have a big problem,” warned Havzi Rizvani of the Association of Popova Shapka cottage owners.

Kajami also said measures are being taken to ease winter traffic and parking pressures: a new access road from the village of Lisec is under construction and, he said, should be completed before the start of the next winter tourist season.

Photo: SDK.MK)