Prague understands, but can't solve its planning problems

In a new look at the oldest problem facing developers in Prague, the Czech economic daily Hospodářské noviny writes that the problem of getting permits in the capital isn't going away anytime soon. It makes the point that despite a general acceptance on nearly all levels of the political spectrum that the process takes too long, solutions keep getting blocked. On the positive side, the city is hiring more public servants to deal with objections to permits, since getting these resolved takes an average of 248 days. The Czech Ministry of Regional Development is sponsoring a new construction law, but even if it gets through Parliament, it won't take effect until 2023.

The same goes for the new Metropolitan Plan, which it's hoped will replace the existing master plan from 1999 by 2023. There are still around 1,000 changes to the old master plan still to be approved, so the city assembly has quite reasonably begun voting on them in batches in order to speed the process. But as HN writes, that still leaves more than two years for the city's housing crisis to worsen and for new projects to remain on the drawing board.