The people of Turrialba, Pérez Zeledón, Filadelfia, Ciudad Neilly, Parrita, Desamparados, Escazú, Alajuelita, Aserrí share a common fear: they live in areas prone to natural disasters.
An analysis based on consultations with experts and reviews of the hazard maps of the National Emergency Commission (CNE) found the danger in these areas is due to their proximity to rivers or unstable mountains.
Allan Astorga, a geologist and academic at the University of Costa Rica (UCR), said that the formula to avoid tragedies is urban planning with environmental criteria. However, bureaucracy blocks the commitment to apply regulatory plans.
The most urgent measure is to modify a small group of articles of 2 regulations of the National Institute of Housing and Urbanism (INVU) from the 1980s, which are terribly permissive with constructions in high – risk sites,”
said Astorga.
In 2015, the State of the Nation Report warned about blocked regulatory plans in Costa Rica. For example, in the Central Valley, the most populous area, only 20 municipalities have a single regulatory plan.
The conditions that transform natural events into disasters are socially constructed. In the Central Valley, and particularly in the GAM, this vulnerability has increased in recent decades due to population growth, constructive pressure, demand for new services and infrastructure, surface and groundwater pollution, rise in poverty and slums and, most especially, weak or nonexistent land-use planning,”
states the document.
According to Leonardo Chacón, president of the National Association of Mayors and Intendencies (ANAI), the municipalities want to fulfill the plans. But there is ‘excessive bureaucracy’. As an example, he mentioned the tedious process in the National Environmental Technical Secretariat (SETENA).
Dionisio Alfaro, a researcher at the National University (UNA), was one of the academics who developed a proposal for a regulatory plan in Upala.
The document recommended relocating the main shopping street, due to its proximity to Zapote River. This plan may have helped mitigate the effects of Hurricane Otto, which affected 449 communities, 1,600 houses and took 10 lives in Costa Rica.