Amendment to the Building Code comes into force

On 29.05.2020, the "Act to Ensure Proper Planning and Approval Procedures during the COVID-19 Pandemic (Planning Security Act - PlanSiG)" came into force. This special regulation was intended to ensure that various laws could be implemented in a legally compliant manner during the pandemic. In the urban land-use planning process, this particularly concerned the public display of draft plans in accordance with Section 3 (2) BauGB, which had to take place on site in the municipalities. Publication on the Internet was previously only possible as a supplement.

The regulations on public and official participation have been comprehensively amended based on the experience of the municipalities and in view of the implementation of the Online Access Act (OZG). In future, all municipalities will be obliged to publish draft development plans on the Internet; the display of planning documents in the municipality or other easy access is only intended as a supplement. Furthermore, the public must be informed in the official gazette that comments should be submitted electronically, but that they can still be sent by post if necessary. This regulation also applies to simplified procedures in accordance with Section 13 BauGB.

The way in which the authorities and public bodies are involved in accordance with Section 4 (2) BauGB has also been revised. The provision of documents and notification by the municipalities is to take place electronically, as is the submission of comments.

If the draft of a development plan is amended or changed after the comments received have been evaluated, it must be published on the internet again, unless the amendment or addition does not lead to a first-time or greater impact on concerns.

The new provision of Section 4a (3) BauGB stipulates that theduration of the publication period and thus the period for obtaining comments in this procedural step can and should not only be shortened appropriately.

In addition, the collection of comments should in future be restricted to the public affected by the amendment or addition as well as the authorities and other public bodies affected, provided this does not lead to a longer procedure. This was also previously an optional provision.

According to the previous regulation, § 6 Para. 4 BauGB and § 10 Para. 2 BauGB stipulated that the higher administrative authority (in this case the Thuringian State Administration Office) had three months to approve land use plans and development plans. This processing time has been reduced to one month. This means that development plans in particular can become legally binding more quickly.