Dubai, 18 November 2019: Dubai Municipality and Roads and Transport Authority (RTA) held a coordination meeting chaired by Dawoud Al Hajri, Director General of the Municipality, and Mattar Al Tayer, Director General and Chairman of the Board of Directors of RTA, to discuss a number of topics and joint projects. The meeting also reviewed the existing efforts to develop joint work management between the two organizations, particularly in infrastructure projects.
Al Hajri stressed that the work teams in the Municipality and RTA are keen to coordinate effectively to ensure the achievement of the programs and plans of the Government of Dubai to provide ways of happiness and wellbeing for the people of Dubai with continuous follow up to the challenges.
He said the meetings and coordination for integration between the two entities will continue to reach the desired results.
Al Tayer stressed that interaction is an essential element in the corporate work system and a key factor for its success and achieving its goals. He said that the coordination between RTA and Municipality goes beyond the official meetings, as there is continuous communication at all levels of leadership of the two organizations and executive working teams on a daily basis, in addition to field visits to various external work sites to discuss the progress of projects and address obstacles.
Dubai Municipality has initiated the idea of an electronic system to study infrastructure projects, through the geospatial application prepared by the Municipality to be accessible to RTA for all road projects in the emirate. The new system aims to reduce coordination procedures between the two departments and transfer all paper correspondence to electronic, which makes it easier for the engineers of the two bodies to propose a scope for the proposed projects.
All infrastructure service lines affected by the scope of the proposed project can be identified comprehensively and updated in the GIS database. The system increases the efficiency and speed of decision making in projects to reduce the time required to approve the schemes through the system to a few minutes.
They also discussed the redesign of road intersections in the residential areas of nationals as well as commercial areas, the re-plotting paved parking for executing Deira Square project as per the approval of the project by the Ruler, the allocation of plots for those who are affected by handing over the land to RTA for Rashidiya Metro. They also discussed the administrative decision on the approval of the plans of major projects and downloading it on the survey system in the Municipality, the compensation for the land affected by government projects within the Emirate of Dubai, and the five-year plan for paving residential areas, in addition to providing the RTA with the required plants for the Route 2020 project.
During the meeting, they reviewed the five-year plan for paving residential areas and discussed the coordination of the roles of work teams in the two departments to implement the plan. In this context, the two sides also discussed the development of standards that will be used to develop and update the pavement plan for residential areas to take into account the urban growth rates in Dubai areas and respond to the requirements and needs of residents in the residential areas, in light of the directives of the wise leadership that put people’s comfort and happiness at the top of the priorities.
The two sides discussed the development of road precincts planning in residential areas to increase the areas allocated for afforestation and landscaping and the expansion of pedestrian paths to enhance the interdependence and integration of infrastructure facilities, in implementation of the strategic objectives of the Dubai 2021 plan aimed at improving the quality and aesthetics of residential communities in general and for citizens in particular.
As part of the preparations of the two organizations to host Dubai International Expo 2020, which will start next October, the two teams confirmed that the work on road projects around the exhibition site is going according to the approved program, and coordination with the Municipality to hand over the completed road projects to the Municipality to implement the work of landscaping. The two sides discussed a number of solutions to ensure the completion of the Expo road projects and the associated landscaping works before the Expo 2020 launch. Innovation was also on the agenda of the meeting. The participants discussed Dubai Municipality’s idea of recycling asphalt waste by grinding and reusing it in temporary road paving projects. The two sides exchanged views on how to apply the idea.
The meeting also dealt with coordination on the new truck resting areas in order to prepare the truck resting areas on highways with necessary vital facilities as part of the efforts of the two departments to raise traffic safety rates and reduce serious accidents resulting from fatigue and tiredness of truck drivers due to driving long distances without taking a break. The representatives of the competent teams agreed to develop those resting areas.
In order to simplify the coordination procedures between the two departments, Dubai Municipality gave presentation on the smart system it has developed to improve the coordination between the teams working in the RTA and Dubai Municipality regarding the planning of infrastructure projects and issuing approvals related to the impact of these projects on the existing plots. The advanced system features make it easier for infrastructure engineers study the effects of these projects and calculate the immediate compensation values. This data helps to suggest the best scope for the infrastructure projects with the least impact on the current planning to the lowest possible number followed by reducing necessary compensation for the affected areas. The system also allows the sharing of charts and data between the two departments electronically in a way that does not require the exchange of paper correspondence, which is in line with the Dubai strategy for paperless transactions.
