RECLASSIFICATION OF RUSTIC LAND AS URBAN LAND FOR HOUSING PURPOSES

The publication of Decree-Law no. 117/2024 of 30 December, which made the seventh amendment to the Legal Framework for Territorial Management Instruments (RJIGT).

The aim of the amendment to the RJIGT is to create conditions that make it possible to solve the housing shortage through significant property development, which is not in keeping with the perspective of dispersed housing development of the ‘one plot of land, one house’ type.

In other words, this possibility of reclassifying land, which is exceptional, is not aimed at resolving individual but collective issues.

The reclassification of rustic land to urban land for housing purposes must be carried out by means of a simplified amendment to the Municipal Masterplan, by decision of the municipality, and provided that, cumulatively:

• The urbanisation to be developed takes place in contiguity with the pre-existing urban land;
• The general and local infrastructures exist or are created, as well as the necessary collective use of equipment and green spaces to cover the needs arising from the new uses;
• It is compatible with the Local Housing Strategy, Municipal Housing Charter or Housing Exchange;
• 70 per cent of the total construction area is for public housing or moderate value housing.

If municipalities decide to reclassify rustic land to urban land for housing purposes, this may not include:

• Land in the National Agricultural Reserve - RAN, classified as class A and class B;
• Land in the National Ecological Reserve - REN, such as the maritime coastal protection strip, the terrestrial coastal protection strip, watercourses and their beds and banks; lakes and lagoons and their beds, banks and protection strips; reservoirs and areas threatened by the sea and areas threatened by floods;
• Areas included in the National System of Classified Areas;
• Areas covered by Special Programmes for the Coastal Zone and Public Water Reservoirs;
• Areas affected by hydro-agricultural schemes.

Source: Municipality of Lagos