Mullaitivu Town as a Node, Engine and Magnet…
The town of Mullaitivu is located in the Mullaitivu District of Northern Province. The district of Mullaitivu emerged as part of the Northern Province in 1979 till then the Province had only Mannar, Trincomalee and Vavuniya Districts. Mullaitivu town is the administrative capital of Mullaitivu District. It is highly connected to its adjacent main towns such as Jaffna in the North, Trincomalee in the South and Vavuniya in the Southwest. Kilinochchi, Mankulam, Oddusuddan, Puthukudiyiruppu are the other main towns that are connected to Mullaitivu town. According to the connectivity analysis, Mullaitivu town possesses third highest connectivity in the Northern Province based on the integration of road network. Further, it is connected by three highways such as Paranthan Highway in the North, Mankulam Highway in the East, and Puliyankulam Highway in the Southwest. This makes Mullaitivu as a major node in the North.
Mullaitivu District covers land area of 2516.9 sq.km and 3.8 percent of the country’s total area.
Mullaitivu has a coastal belt of 70 km and the area is rich with four lagoons such as Kokkilai, Nayaru, Nanthikadal and Mathalan which have high potentials for prawn farming. The prawn cultivation and fishing are indigenous economic base of the town date back to colonial era. Most popular kinds of prawns are found in the Nandikadal Lagoon which is exported to Singapore and Thailand.
Mullaitivu is a designated service center in the Northern Province. Traditionally, the economy is characterized by fishing and agriculture. Thus, it is rich with green and blue and different ecosystems such as forest land, shrub land, coconut plantation, and agriculture land and water bodies.
Figure 2: Strategic Location of Mullaitivu
Figure 3: Connectivity of Mullaitivu
Figure 4: Mullaitivu as a Main Node
Mullaitivu was one of the battle grounds of the civil conflicts which were burning in the country for decades. The result was not only destruction of property or livelihood, but also impacted negatively on the socio-cultural asset of the city. While the city was experiencing the hardships of the civil war, unfortunately the town was hit by the Tsunami in 2004. This doubled the negative impacts and hardships people were experiencing, the two disasters created a milestone in the history of Mullaitivu. Today, the town is rising up from all the hardship and marching forward for steady growth.
Mullaitivu Development Plan
The Uniqueness of Spatial Form of Mullaitivu Town
The city of Mullaitivu is unique in its spatial form due to the natural setting it has around.
The town is formed with water in three sides, wetlands, paddy lands, coconut and Palmyra plantations as well as forest cover. While the Indian Ocean draws the Eastern border of the city, the shimmering water of Nanthikadal Lagoon marks the West boarder.
The widespread plots of paddy fields add glamour and welcoming to the city and the greenery forest strip in between two blue lines has contributed to the completion of the unique city form of natural features.
The city is linear in shape which is formed due to the sea and forest lands in the East and paddy and lagoon in the West. The settlement areas lie in the middle which is expanding to North and South over the period of time. The dense growth in the South side up to Nayaru is visible in the settlement pattern.
Figure 5: The Unique Spatial Form of Mullaitivu Town
The physical feature of Mullaitivu District is flat land, generally sloping to the East and North in the Western part. The water feature in the three sides of the city makes it a peninsula which also creates many small forms of water sources such as tanks, ponds and wetlands.
Mullaitivu District has 70 km of coastal belt and the sea shore is identified as deep sea in many parts of the Mullaitivu district. The four lagoons such as Kokkilai, Nayaru, Nanthikadal and Mathalan have high potentials for prawn farming. The elevation varies from sea level to 36.5 meters. Major soil groups are reddish brown earth and red yellow lato soils which are suitable for cultivation. Due to the natural setting of the town, salt water intrusion, flash floods and high proportion of environmentally sensitive lands in the town are the major constraints for
urban development. Figure 6: A Sketch of the Spatial Form of Mullaitivu Town
Systems, Patterns and Network
The systems approach of understanding a city is applied here to read the city in terms of its systems, patterns and networks as well as its relationships in making the city form. The system considered in this study is the extensive hydro system of the city, the patterns include vegetation pattern (paddy and forest cover) and settlement distribution pattern. The network in this study consists of road network.
Accordingly, more than 30% of the district is covered by various forms of water bodies (Fig 7) and more than 60% of land area is forest cover (Fig 11). The road network and settlement pattern (Fig 10) shows that high accessibility (or high concentration of road network) leads to the
emergence of settlements. Figure 7: Hydro System of Mullaitivu District
Figure 8: Hydro System and Vegetation Pattern of Mullaitivu District
Figure 9: Hydro System, Vegetation Pattern and Settlement Pattern of Mullaitivu District Figure 11: Hydro System, Vegetation Pattern,
Forest Cover and Settlement Pattern of Mullaitivu District
Figure 10: Road Network and Settlement Pattern Mullaitivu District
Functional Boundary Delineation
It is vital to identify the region within which this particular development plan will have a direct effect.
Therefore, the Strategic Planning Approach requires a carefully demarcated boundary in addition to the formal administrative boundary.
Accordingly, Weighted Overlay Technique was applied to identify the functional boundary for the development plan. The criteria considered are existing settlement pattern, vegetation pattern, road network and hydro system. In deciding what is most crucial for development, the criteria are rated as follows: 45% weightage for hydro system as it is the most crucial element in the town, 30% for road network, 15% for settlement pattern and 10% for vegetation cover as it the most sensitive element to protect.
Then, the compatibility with the existing administrative boundary was also considered. Accordingly, the resulted composite map shows the selected project boundary in the Fig 12.
Figure 12: Identified project boundary through Weighted Overlay Technique
The Vision
Based on the principles such as making water features of the town as the catalyst for development, making the city disaster resilient city in its all parts, making Mullaithivu a visitors’ city, maximum use of untapped potentials, external investment is a major need, and conservation of its natural resources, the following vision was formulated.
To be the Aqua Citadel of North in 2030
Figure 13: The Aqua Citadel of North in 2030
The Strategic Action Projects
In order to achieve the vision, there were four action projects formulated as follows:
1. Disaster Management Project
2. Fishery Infrastructure Development Project 3. Tourism Development Project
4. Town Center Improvement Project
The above projects lead to make Mullaitivu as a safer city, economic development, transforming the untapped potentials of the city to the fullest, and revitalizing the town center to fit into the emerging needs and demands.
1. Disaster Management Project
Disaster Management Strategy for the Present Town
Figure 14: Proposed Evacuation Places Figure 15: Proposed Evacuation Routes
Figure 16: Proposed Green Belt for Town Center and Nayaru
1. Disaster Management Project
Disaster Management Strategy for the Future Growth of the Town The strategy for the future growth
of the town is to shift the future expansion towards interior part of the city. The present town lies on the coast within 1.5km from the sea belt. However, there are many magnets that could attract development towards interior. This will give a long term sustainability and safety to the city. Since the interior lands are highly sensitive with lagoon reservation and paddy lands, this strategy proposes a linear development towards interior towards Thanniyoothu and Oddusuddan.
Figure 17: Proposed Disaster Management Spatial Strategy
Figure 18: A 3D View of the Existing and Proposed Spatial Strategy for the Future Growth
2. Fishery Infrastructure Development Project
Major Issues in the Fishery Sector of Mullaithivu
1. Less fish production over the past few years even though Mullaitivu district is located in the high fish production zone.
2. Lack of basic fishery infrastructures such as ice plant, market, storage and multi-day boats.
3. Less number of active fishermen
These identified challenges required an effective mechanism for fish production. The existing inland and ocean based water features in Mullaitivu town is a great potential that needed a careful planning to utilize it for the economic development of the city.
Scenario Development towards the Fishery Infrastructure Strategy
Figure 19: Scenario Development towards the Fishery Infrastructure Strategy
The Need of Multi-Day Boats for Fishing
Presently multi-day boats are not used by the fishermen in Mullaitivu due to the absence of anchorage facilities. There are two requirements for the anchorage of multi-day boats: wave barriers and deep water approach. The deep sea character is already there in Mullaitivu sea base. However, there are no wave barriers. The existing natural wave barrier in the Nadikadal Lagoon outlet is going through a major terrain transformation due to the monsoonal waves.
Figure 20: Shoreline Behavior of Nadikadal lagoon Outlet Source: Department of Civil Engineering, University of Moratuwa
Construction of Fishery Harbour as an Option
Feasibility study for the harbor construction was carried out in Mullaitivu shoreline. The spot that was considered for feasibility study is the location of grounded ship “Farah”. During 2005, 2009 and 2011 periods, the location of Farah ship has gone through major shoreline transformation with sand accumulation in the South and san erosion in the North. This makes an uncertainty condition of constructing such man-made wave barriers.
The below Fig 21 shows the shoreline transformation over the years in the location of ship is grounded.
Figure 21: The Vicinity of Farah Grounded Ship
Source: Department of Civil Engineering, University of Moratuwa
The Multi-Day Boat Anchorage Strategies
Based on the review and feasibility studies of various options for multi-day boat anchorage, there are two main strategies proposed:
1. Using natural harbor setting for multi-day boat anchoring:
a. There are three natural harbor settings in Mullaitivu District shore.
Nandikadal Lagoon Outlet, Nayaru Lagoon Outlet and Chundikulam Lagoon Outlet. Since Nadikadal Lagoon Outlet plays major role in terms of its cultural value and ecological value, the other two outlets are the options.
2. Service Landing Center
a. Service Landing Center includes repairing centre, storage centre, purchasing centre and ice plant. These are the major lacking facilities for fishing activity.
Theonagar was selected for this Service Landing Center. The reasons are presently 60% of the boats in Mullaitivu are landing in Theonagar and land is available in beach side from Kallapadu to Theonagar
Figure 22: The Proposed Service Landing Center in Theonagar and its Cross Sections
3. Tourism Development Project In introducing tourism as a great economic potential for Mullaitivu town, its natural and cultural assets were identified as the strengths. The natural assets of Mullaitivu include Palmyrah plantations, paddy lands, wetlands, lagoon systems, sea beaches and forest covers.
Accordingly, the proposed tourism zones that are identified in Mullaitivu are Nandikadal Lagoon shore and the Palmyrah plantations around the Nandikadal Lagoon, beach park development in the town center, tourist hotel development along the coast and ponds as well as Nayaru
island. Figure 23: Potential Tourism Zones
Blue Bay Beach Tourist Zone
As beach based tourism zones, two belts were identified, One is 3km down from the town centre and the other belt is from Uppumawelli to Alambil. Each strip is 2km in length. The reasons behind the selection of these two belts were the contexts are bit unique which enhance the experience to the tourists while they travel. Fig 24 shows the two blue bay tourism belts.
The main settlement land exists by having the small ponds surrounded by the greenery in a side while having the blue sea in the other side. Puliyankulam, KottuvatikKulam, ChilawatteKulam, KariketamKulam and NettisuttanKulam are the ponds spread in the context.
Further, most of the land area is covered by scrubs and there is less number of settlements in the sites.
Figure 24: Blue Bay Beach Tourism Zones
Proposed tourist activities in the beach tourism zones are:
1. Improve the road network, particularly direct access to beach area from the main access road.
2. Madel sites in this zone needs to be conserved and not disturbed by the tourism activities. Meanwhile, providing fishing experience for tourists also promoted.
3. Beach cabanas between Madel sites
4. Proposed Activities for deep sea beach.
Further, adhering to the regulations of Department of Fishery on the declared Madel Sites is considered.
Town Center Beach Park
In any coastal towns, beach is an asset and is a more attractive place. This beach strip in Mullaitivu is located within 500 m from the town center. Already there are some leading activities in a city located near to this beach such as administrative activities and banking activities. This will attract other supportive activities and more people in the future. This will require open space and recreation activities for people. This concern led to the proposal of town center Beach Park.
The Beach Park will consist of open air theater, Children Park, board walk, volleyball court, guest houses and hotels.
Figure 25: 3D View of the Town Center Beach Park
Palmyra Island
The Palmyra Island is proposed as a tourist destination around Nadikadal Lagoon is because the uniqueness it adds to the entire city. The existing Nadikadal Lagoon is the welcoming and pleasing spot in Mullaitivu town and the Palmyra tree covers that exist around the lagoon is the most admirable part of the town. This is considered as a great tourist potential.
Figure 26: Nandikadal Lagoon Palmyra Island
Further, the most important concern in this proposal is to converge the life of villagers and tourists in this spot to give economic benefits to the villagers and to give experiential tourism for visitors.
There are three main elements in this proposal:
1. Center for Palmyra Products 2. Palmyra Plantation
3. Cluster of Specialized Villages
Center for Palmyra products will provide handicraft training for residents, exhibit Palmyra products and provide tourists with an opportunity of experiencing the Palmyra products. The specialized villages will produce Palmyra products and gain economic benefits.
Nayaru Vacation Island
The location of Nayaru Lagoon is very important in Mullaitivu town. Accessibility to this area from Mullaitivu town center is ensured by Mullaitivu-Kokkilai highway which goes through the land area in between lagoon and sea. Nayaru Island which located in Nayaru lagoon is covered with forest and it is a habitat for many species. Considering the potentials of the particular site, there are many hotspots identified to promote tourism activities there.
Meanwhile, it is ensured the conservation of the natural elements in order to maintain the place as it is in terms of bio diversity and natural beauty.
Considering the environmental sensitivity of this site, the proposals are very carefully crafted as follows:
1. Blue-Green Way Cycling Project to provide outstanding cycling experience and nature feeling for visitors
2. Blue-Green Nayaru Beach Resort to provide environmental based outdoor experience for visitors.
Figure 27: Proposals of the Nayaru Vacation Island
Figure 28: 3D Models of the Proposals of the Nayaru Vacation Island
Development Guidelines for the Nayaru Tourism
Permitted materials for construction are timber, clay and other environment friendly materials.
Plot Coverage is 30%
Height restrictions: Maximum one story (to ensure undisturbed visual access & the area being low lying, to match the carrying capacity)
Building Line: 200m from the lagoon edge.
No waste disposals into the Lagoon
4. Town Center Development Project
It was realized that to support the proposed future developments the contribution of town center is going to be extremely vital. Although the present town center has lots of facilities and services being the district administrative capital, certain challenges are there.
In this proposal, it was decided to make the town center to be a facilitator, a service provider and a benefits receiver of the tourism, fishery and agro centers.
In the structure of the present town center, the major drawback is the absence of concentration of land use activities. The bus terminal, administrative activities, and CBD functions are located far from each other. Therefore, this particular Development Plan proposes Urban Node with Intersection-Integration-Mixed Use concept for the Mullaitivu town center.
Figure 29: The Proposals for the Town Center
Major proposals for the town center are:
1. New Bus Circulation and Bus Stop 2. Urban Square
3. Lagoon park 4. Land Subdivision
5.
Improved Roads with Side Walks The bus circulation routes and bus stop are proposed due to the inefficiency of the existing bus circulation arrangements. Due to the shift of bus terminal this particular proposal is found necessary. Urban Square with shopping complex was resulted as a need identified from people and visitors.Lagoon park project adds more open spaces to the town center and it will act as a flood retention area during rainy season. Land subdivision provides more efficient arrangements of land uses and comfort.
Figure 30: The Proposed Urban Square and Shopping Complex
Figure 31: The Proposed Lagoon Park and Recreational Activities
ODDUSUDDAN DEVELOPMENT PLAN
1. IntroductionOddusuddan is one of the important township, located at a strategic location in the Mullaitivu District. Being a prominent agricultural town and a town that is affected by the thirty years of civil conflicts, this town requires planning intervention to carefully address the pressing needs and trends. In this background, Oddusuddan Development Plan aims at guiding its development ensuring social, economic and environmental sustainability to wipe out the ashes to enlighten their future.
2. Contextual Analysis and Boundary Delineation
The contextual analysis is focused on understanding the existing situation in the context which was done adopting the systems, patterns network approach in which the existing natural systems, agriculture based settlement pattern and connectivity analysis were carried out. These findings were also applied to delineate the planning boundary.
Figure 32: The Planning Boundary of Oddusuddan
As per the process of boundary delineation, four mandates were found important which shape the city form and function. The mandates were hydrology, vegetation, settlement pattern & activity pattern and accessibility. Hydrology includes the tanks, streams and catchment area as the attributes; vegetation includes the forests and agricultural areas; settlement pattern includes the settlement patches and their distance from main town centers as attributes and accessibility is studied in terms of road network and its level of connectivity to the settlement areas.
Figure 32 shows the finalized planning boundary of Oddusuddan Development Plan.
Accordingly there are 2 boundaries, i.e., immediate boundary (shown in black line) and secondary boundary (shown in red line). Settlement concentration and activity pattern were considered to demarcate the immediate boundary and hydrology based sensitivity was considered for secondary boundary.
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3. Vision Formulation
In order to decide the strategic vision of Oddusuddan town for year 2025, the below aspects were studied.
1. Review of national and regional policy framework
According to the National Physical Plan 2030, more than 50% of the land cover belong to Mullaithivu District has proposed as conserved forest cover. Further, national projects such as Mankulam–Mullaittivu Highway, Agriculture Research Center in Vavuniya, Wind Power Plant and Fishery Harbor in Mullaitivu town and Special Purpose City & Domestic Airport at Mankulam are also proposed as part of the National Physical Plan 2030. Meanwhile, Northern Regional Development Plan of NPPD has proposed Emergency Northern Recovery Project - Restoration of Water Supply Schemes in Oddusuddan, Japan Assistance for North Reconstruction Project - support livelihood activities of resettled communities by providing agricultural and fishery equipments, Northern Road Rehabilitation Project - Rehabilitation & improvement of 52.6km length of Oddusuddan- Nedunkerny Road.
2. Key challenges of the locality
The identified challenges were housing related, livelihood, amenities and infrastructure related. Further, the root causes of the problems were also identified which would guide the effective decision making.
3. Key potentials of the locality
Potentials such as land availability for agricultural, livestock and infrastructure development, linear development of the settlements along the road without disturbing to agricultural activities, unique historic value of the area and suitable soil condition for wide range of crops and roof tiles making were identified.
The Strategic Vision of Oddusuddan
“THE LEADING AGRO LOGISTICS HUB IN VANNI BY 2025”
By year 2025, Oddusuddan will be an agro logistic hub with a blend of strong agro- economic activities to create an economically vibrant city with diverse opportunities and rich culture, where all citizens enjoy a safe and livable environment.
4. SWOT Analysis towards Vision
A detail SWOT analysis was carried out in order to identify the strengths, weaknesses, threats and opportunities that are prevailing towards achieving the vision.
Following the SWOT Analysis, a development scenario was formulated considering the determined elements, key targets, driving forces and trends, start and end conditions, obstacles and uncertainties, major events and episodes.
Figure 33: The Symbolic Representation of the Vision of Oddusuddan Town
5. Strategies
The vision is to achieve Agro Logistic Hub in Oddusuddan area in 2025, for that its vital to identify what are the main requirements to have Agro Logistic Hub. There are certain requirements identified such as increased production, business and marketing, production and processing, collection and distribution mechanism, agriculture settlements, better accessibility, intermediacy, and centrality.
The above requirements can be gained through the below three strategic projects:
1. Town Center Improvement Project is aimed at improvement of city centre with an attractive livable environment. This includes developments of Thanthonreeshwaram urban square and sacred area, commercial belt and complete streets, bus terminal and market, urban housing and urban waste management.
2. Agro Logistic Hub Development Project – Agro hub development project is aimed at developing Oddusuddan as a regional agriculture center through providing storage facilities for village level collection centers and Terminal Market Centre (TMC) to handle paddy, vegetables, fruits and milk; improve local roads connecting village level agricultural centers to TMC and provide infrastructure for TMC and attract private investments in agriculture sector.
3. Village Level Amenities & Livelihood Diversification Project is aimed at diversify economic activities based on local natural resources, traditional industries and local community skills; and to improve access to basic amenities at village level ensuring high quality of life for village community.
1. AGRO LOGISTICS HUB DEVELOPMENT PROJECT
The concept of agro logistics hub comes up with the supply chain of agricultural products from farmer to the market. Basically agro- logistics hub facilitates services to the effective and efficient collection and distribution mechanism of agricultural products. Agro logistics are an efficient integration of transportation, stores, food processing and other value added services.
Integration of such facilities helps in shortening the supply chain for the producers who had to traverse a long marketing channel to reach the market due to unavailability of the necessary infrastructure.
Agro logistics hub is not located at a particular place; it is a network of the following elements.
1. Terminal Market Center
2. Village Level Collection Centers 3. Regional Service Centers
Figure 34: Agro Logistic Hub Model
Agro Logistic Hub can be achieved through the below strategic actions:
1. Storage facilities for village level centers and terminal market centers.
2. Establish collection and distribution center 3. Establish terminal market center
4. Provide road network for agro hub.
Figure 37: Agro Logistic Hub Design
Figure 35: Location of Terminal Market Center Figure 36: Identification of the Site Suitability for the Agro Hub
2. LIVELIHOOD DIVERSIFICATION AND VILLAGE AMENITY IMPROVEMENT PROJECT
The below three strategies are formulated to achieve the village amenity improvement:
1. Select suitable diversified livelihood options at village level –
The existing livelihood options that can be considered as potentials such as inland fishery, livestock, Palmyra production, Tiles and brick production and nature tourism.
2. Establish a community based mobilization mechanism for livelihood development - Through Multipurpose Community Based Society for sectors such as brick &
tile making, nature based tourism, Palmyra production, livestock development and inland fishery.
3. Promote technological improvement to identify livelihood options –
Train laborers to handle new equipments, eco tourism training, programmes for women to make Palmyra products and livestock technology training.
3. TOWN CENTER IMPROVEMENT PROJECT
In order to achieve “Agro Logistic Hub” in Oddusuddan, the following important projects were identified: construct Oddusuddan-Puthukuduiruppu Road and local roads development, bus terminal to facilitate local users and commuters, market facilities for people, open spaces and storm water management.
Bus Terminal and Market Development
Road Development and Commercial Belt Development
Urban Square and Sacred Area Development Housing Development
Figure 38: Town Center Improvement Plan
Project Team
Labana A. Kularatne H.N.S.
Madushani. K.H.A. Kumari N.G.T.M.
Udeni.W.M.T. Kumari S.N.B.G.N.C.
Ranasinghe.D.A.S. Kumari. W.A.L.
Ajikala.R. Maduranga R.P.D.
Tharaga.S. Mathumai.U.
Artigala. A.W.H.N. Nanayakkara S.N.H.L.P.
Bandara. H.M.L.S. Nilmini.K.P.I.
Bandara R.M.P.N.S. Perera.K.T.Y.J.
Chithravel.T. Prasadini. J.M.V.
Deerasinghe D.A.C.L. Randeniya T.D.
Dissanayake W.M.P.L. Rangani.K.S.
Dissanayake M.K.N.P.K. Rathnayaka R.M.K.I.K.
Fahima J. Riswan M.M.
Ganesh M. Sampath Y.D.S.N.
Herath.H.M.S.D. Senanayake. D.S.V.
Herath.H.R.M.D. Shiromini.K.E.
Jayasinghe K.D.P.P. Subasinghe.S.M.S.P.
Jezan. T Thamarasi.G.H.M.
Kanchani.A.N. Wijegunarathne E.E.
Kishoker S.S. Wimaladasa.G.J.C.
Karunasena J.N. Yapa. Y.M.V.S.K.
Anuradha K.V.T Fahima Asma M.H
Dilanka U.L.D.S Pushpakumari K.M.A.J
Project Coordinators
Dr Jagath Munasinghe Plnr Chethika Abenayake Plnr Amila Jayasinghe Plnr Shalini Mariyathas Ms Priyanwada Sinhapathirana Mr Kanishka Guluwita
