National Park in Palestine
Date
2016
Authors
Khalelia, Aayat
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Abstract
The project considering the planning of Palestinian national park , definition specifications, objectives and functions that should exist in it, as this kind of projects not exist in West Bank and this was through a series of studies for several cases in the world firstly ,and the Arab level secondly, to know over the possibility of creation this kind of parks in the West Bank also, the benefits that the park will be provided at the national level in various fields in Economics, tourism and nature.
The studies show that national parks take basically a kind of protection for the Lands of vital nature and have sensitivity to environmental aspects that must be preserved, thus the Palestinian situation were studied according to the nature of the land in it , knowing biodiversity and protected areas and the possibility of establishment a national park on the land in the West Bank ,as the Palestinian situation has a particular political conditions taking into account the political divisions of the land according to Oslo agreement , therefore the idea of the national park supports natural protection and preservation of the Palestinian land as being in conflict with the Israeli occupation, in addition to the economic and tourism benefits for the nation as a whole.
The first stage of planning of the park is site selection, which is occurring by applying a set of criteria based on case studies that have been studied and taking into account the specificity of the Palestinian situation, then two alternatives in the north of West Bank areas were weighed, which are classified as areas of vital diversity by the Palestinian national protection plan. As a result, Tubas forests in the North of the city of Tubas, which located administratively within the territory of Aqabba town and Tubas city, took the highest mark.
then the site of the proposed park were analyzed in various aspects of the regional , local and spatial level .where the site contains approximately 700 dounm of pine trees classified as forests by the agricultural classification for the value of land in the West Bank as well as the surrounding land with agricultural value of the medium and high value.
After the selection and analysis of the site the final plan of the proposed national park has been planned, starting with the proposed street network, then uses and functions in it. The area of the final plan reached 3948 dunom were distributed to the following uses, protecting areas used for agriculture , areas of administration and services , areas of recreation and camping, zoo, botanical garden ,areas of hiking and barbecue areas.
The final step of the design were took a part of the zoo area, which has an area of 65 acres and designed in detail.
Finally, the effect of the presence of this type of parks in the West Bank were discussed in different aspects such as tourism, the environment , the economy, planning and social aspects.