Wednesday 19th May - Day 77

I will be on site tomorrow for the handover of the road works and the start of the construction of the kerbs which will define the borders of the quadrants and form the pavements when the first houses are constructed at Palma do Mar.

Over the next six weeks we will be laying in excess of 3,600 linear metres of kerbstones, 280 lot boundary posts, 5,000 linear metres for water supply and 21 posts for the supply of electricity.

Thursday 13th May 2010 - Day 71

The infrastructure works at Palma do Mar are very near to completion with the roads and drainage works scheduled for completion on Friday 21 May.

The implantation of the kerbs and electricity pylons are scheduled to start this week, with full completion within 45 days.  Due to a delay in the Liçenca Instalaçao being issued by the Environmental agency the full completion of the infrastructure works will be delayed until the 30 June 2010.

These final works are starting at quadrant D34 BN and will progress through the quadrants to finally complete at quadrant D34 BB.  Therefore some of the early quadrants will be completed before the 30 June.

We will be updating our infrastructure blog as and when quadrants are completed over the next 6 weeks.

Wednesday 28th April 2010 - Day 56

The roads on Palma do Mar were started on Monday 26th April 2010 with the contractors pushing ahead to make up for the lost time due to the delay in the licence. In most cases this work is fairly straight forward in that a specialist machine will cut the roads into the soil and sand normally to a depth of approximately 20cm-30cm. Another machine will then compact the road and form the correct gradient for the drainage system to work when the rainy season starts.

Due to us taking advantage of the natural topography of the land and incorporating that into our drainage project we have to excavate to, in some cases in excess of a meter and this means that we have to carryout earth movement across the whole development to ensure that the land remains regular.

Over the next two to three weeks over 5,000 cubic meters of earth will be moved in this process.

Monday 19th April 2010 - Day 47

We received the last two licences we require at Palma do Mar on Friday 16 April. In order to complete the works we had to obtain the "Licença Prévia": A preliminary authorization from the state environmental agency for the planning of the project. The licence approves the location, conception, and environmental viability of the project and the "Licença de Instalação" which allows the start of construction according to the specifications of the plans and projects approved.

Both of these licences are issued by the state environmental agency, Sudema, who follow guidelines issued by State and Federal Government as well as the Federal environmental agency IBAMA (Instituto Brasileiro do Meio Ambiente e dos Recursos Naturais Renováveis).

We have also had to prepare further architectural projects for AESA (Agência Executiva de Gestão das Águas do Estado da Paraíba) with regard to our provision of water on the site. Obtaining the licences has taken more time than had been planned for as in the past a development site such as Palma, with a pre-existing loteamento planning permission would have been granted the necessary licences quickly and with a minimum of checks.

This is no longer the situation in North East Brazil and the more recent stringent environmental laws and regulations are being applied retrospectively to older planning permissions that have already been granted, with no guarantee that they will ever be able to obtain a new full planning permission.

With the new licences issued for Palma do Mar, individual planning applications for the construction of villas on the lots are effectively rubber stamped, as both the Town hall and environmental agency have already confirmed the services and legal status of Palma.

We are signing the next construction contract today, which will form the roads and put in place the kerbstones.

Wednesday 24th March 2010 - Day 21

The site has now been cleared. Next week the roads are being cut into the site and lined with kerbstones and the drainage works will commence.

Wednesday 17th March 2010 - Day 14

The land has now been cleared from quadrant BN to quadrant BB on the Eastern side of the development, with the remainder to be cleared this week.

Wednesday 10th March 2010 - Day 7

With the site setup complete we have managed to clear more than 20,000 sq m of vegetation from Quadrant BN and Quadrant BL. We have retained as many mature trees and bushes as possible.

The works will accelerate next week as much of the earth is is moved onto other parts of the site in order to provide a more level development site.

Wednesday 3rd March 2010 - Day 1

Following the receipt of the ‘Autorização para uso alternativo do solo’ licence from the environmental agency, Sudema, on Monday, the engineers arrived on site today with the digger to start clearing the land. Phase one involves the removal of all of the vegetation on the site, some leveling works and the initial dragging of the roads, which bisect the quadrants. The trees and bushes on site which will be kept have now been marked and we expect to see a lot of progress over the coming days......