During five months of war in Ukraine, millions of square meters of housing, production facilities, and infrastructure were destroyed. To speed up the recovery, Ukrainian legislation governing urban planning was simplified. Alexandra Fedotova, Partner, Attorney and Head of Ader Haber's real estate and construction practice and the Board Member of the Charity Fund Housing For IDP, reviewed the changes in an article prepared by the Ukrainian Real Estate Club for Property Forum.
The Unified State Electronic System in the field of construction
Just before the war started, the Unified State Electronic System in the field of construction (hereinafter - USESC) portal was introduced. Using the portal, you can receive administrative and other services in the field of construction (in particular, to obtain the initial data for design, to obtain the right to begin construction, put the object into operation, etc.), to complain about unauthorized construction, actions or inaction of authorized bodies.
On 1 July 2022, the list of USESC users was expanded. In particular, the following were added to the list: law enforcement agencies, local state administrations, local self-government bodies, military and civil-military administrations, special insurance fund institutions and the expert-appeal board for licensing issues.
New city-planning documentation
New city-planning documentation should be developed in the form of an electronic document on the updated cartographic base in the digital form of the state geodetic coordinate system USK-2000 and a unified system of classification and coding of city planning objects to form databases of the cadastre.
Ukraine is gradually moving away from paper-based urban planning documentation.
Dismantling of destroyed objects
Many facilities were destroyed as a result of military action, which requires a significant amount of dismantling work. At present, this procedure has been simplified. Dismantling is carried out by decision of the local authorities on the basis of documentation developed by the contractor, without obtaining permission.
According to the results of dismantling an act of dismantling is drawn up in electronic form using the Register of Construction Activities. In the case of a complete dismantling of an object, the act of dismantling is the basis for annulling the technical passport and excluding the object from the State Register of Rights to Real Estate.
Capital repair of damaged objects
Under martial law, the development of construction projects for capital repair of facilities damaged as a result of military action is allowed to be carried out as part of the act of expertise, which defines physical volumes of work, an explanatory note specifying the conditions of work performance, cost estimate documentation drawn up from the report on the results of the survey.
The decision on the scope of design documentation is taken by the chief architect of the project and/or the chief engineer of the project in coordination with the customer, which is specified in the task of designing.
Previously, the implementation of major repairs required the compulsory development of project documentation.
Construction of individual residential buildings
Currently, the construction of individual houses, garden and cottage houses no higher than two floors (excluding attic floor) with an area of up to 500 square meters, as well as outbuildings and structures, garages, elements of landscaping and gardening of the land can be carried out without obtaining building passport development of the land. Construction is carried out on the basis of a notification submitted to the state electronic system.
Placement of temporary facilities/housing for internally displaced persons (IDPs)
For the duration of the legal regime of martial law and within one year after its termination or cancellation, the placement of temporary facilities, their complexes designed for life support (temporary residence and service) of IDPs, and engineering networks necessary to service such facilities are allowed on land plots of any category.
A special procedure for the construction of certain facilities is enshrined, namely:
- construction (new construction or reconstruction) of buildings for temporary accommodation of IDPs (for workers of displaced enterprises or socially vulnerable groups of the population);
- construction of production facilities of enterprises displaced (evacuated) from the war zone;
- construction of river ports and terminals on the Danube River, the decision on their placement has been made by the authorized body, and their placement is also permitted in the landscape and recreational area;
- location of the objects of the road and transport infrastructure (except for the road service objects), engineering networks, main gas pipelines;
- the placement of places of temporary storage of waste from the destruction caused by military actions, terrorist acts, sabotage or the implementation of works to eliminate their consequences;
- placement of multimodal terminals and production and transhipment complexes, expediency of urgent placement (expansion) of which is determined by the authorized body.
Such construction works may be performed without regard to existing city planning documentation, or even in the absence of such documentation.
