The Plzeň Region has yesterday announced a tender for the preparation of an update of the regional development plan (ZUR). It will also concern the reserve military airport Líně near Plzeň, where the army wants to build a logistics centre for Czech soldiers and NATO and an active reserve base. Discussion of the principles should take 1.5 to 2.5 years, regional governor Rudolf Špoták (Pirates) said yesterday after the approval by the regional council. The preparer will be chosen within six months.
Last year, the region commissioned an update of the ZUR number 5, which was requested by the state so that a strategic business park could be built in Líně for the Volkswagen concern, which wanted to build a factory for electric car batteries there for about CZK 120 billion. But the carmaker refused last November and the military decided to modernise and further develop the airport.
“We are counting on finalizing the change of the zoning plan number 5 at the next council meeting (April 8). The Ministry of Defence will put its requirements for networks, transport connections and for facilities that have not yet been technically specified into the change of the master plan number 6, which is a county-wide plan, where we expect higher dozens of requirements from towns and villages,” the governor said.
He said that optimistically, the changes under designation number 6 will be ready in 1.5 years, and pessimistically in 2.5 years. The municipalities around the airport originally wanted the pending update to ZUR number 5 to be completed, which could be done this year. “It was the army’s request that Lina be put into number six (ZUR 6),” the governor said. According to him, the earlier council had already approved the announcement and processing of the update and suggestions are already coming in from the municipalities, which the selected contractor will incorporate.
Even the deadline for the completion of ZUR 6, i.e. in 2.5 years, suits the army, according to the governor. “For the first projects of the things it would like to have there, it would have money in the budget for 2028, the implementation would be by 2030,” he said.
Špoták could not say today whether the use and development of Lini would be the main part of the document. “I don’t know what the municipalities will come up with. The ZUR will address more areas,” he said. He said it will certainly limit the building of large industrial zones, of which there are already many in the region and which are attracting more and more foreign workers because of the region’s long-standing low unemployment.
According to the regional leadership, the 700 hectares at the Lini airport that are still there will no longer be earmarked for industry in ZUR No. 6. Miroslav Hlaváč, deputy chief of the general staff, told the mayors on Friday that the army wants to use the original 390-hectare site. “The fact that the army will fit into the historically given airport area and not expand into the surrounding area is good news for us. The army has also confirmed that it in no way wants industry in the neighbourhood, which is a great reassurance for the hinterland of our villages,” said Martin Sobotka, the Mayor of Dobřany (Aktivní Dobřany). The municipalities would like the army to build green belts around the airport and hope for a quick discussion of changes to the regional zoning plan. A series of individual meetings with the municipalities and negotiations on infrastructure will be held after Easter.
Source: CTK
