What Thu Duc City needs to do to create a breakthrough and promote growth for Ho Chi Minh City

After nearly 4 years of establishment based on the merger of 3 old districts (District 2, District 9, Thu Duc District), Thu Duc City has become the first model of a city within a city directly under the Central Government in the country. Over the years, the economic growth, gross regional domestic product (GRDP), budget revenue, and investment capital of the new city have continuously increased, gradually moving towards the goal of becoming a new growth driver for Ho Chi Minh City as initially expected.

However, Thu Duc City has not yet made a breakthrough in infrastructure, there are still unfinished large projects and works, and inherent problems affecting people's lives such as traffic jams and flooding have not been completely resolved. Urban planning and policy experts also recognize that Thu Duc City still has a series of internal bottlenecks that need to be resolved, and people's perception of the development achievements here is still quite vague.

Thu Duc City still has many internal bottlenecks that need to be resolved after nearly 4 years of establishment (Photo: Hai Long).

In an interview with Dan Tri , Dr. Tran Du Lich, Chairman of the Advisory Council for the implementation of Resolution 98, acknowledged that “the higher the expectation, the higher the challenge” is what Thu Duc City is facing. In the transformation of a special urban area, Thu Duc still has many problems to solve, the contrast between infrastructure and role and position that need to be narrowed, and old and new problems that need to be solved.

Thu Duc has actually only been a city for 1 year.

After nearly 4 years of merging to form the first city within a city in the country with great expectations, how do you evaluate the development of Thu Duc City over the past time?

– First of all, I would like to say that the establishment of a city model within a centrally-governed city for Thu Duc was necessary at that time. This assessment was based on the nature, scale, potential, and advantages of all three previous districts.

With a land area of ​​over 211km2 and a population of over 1 million people, this is an area with a lot of potential to create breakthrough development. Among the centers that are shaped as the driving force for development, Thu Thiem New Urban Area is shaped as a major financial center; High-tech Park and part of the National University are shaped as centers for high-level scientific and technological training and research.

Thu Thiem new urban area is shaped into a major financial center of Thu Duc City and Ho Chi Minh City (Photo: Hai Long).

Thu Duc has a great competitive advantage with Cat Lai port, the largest and most modern international container port in Vietnam. Nearby is Phu Huu port with a convenient location on the Dong Nai River. In particular, Thu Duc City concentrates the hubs and infrastructure to develop the logistics industry.

Before the merger, the localities were District 2, District 9, Thu Duc District with very fast urbanization speed. The area has formed new model urban areas.

Thu Duc City was announced to be established at the end of 2020 and officially came into operation at the beginning of 2021. However, I assess that Thu Duc City has actually only been a city for over a year. The timeline is from when Resolution 98 piloting a number of specific mechanisms and policies for the development of Ho Chi Minh City took effect.

Before the resolution took effect, although it was called a city within a city, Thu Duc was still just a district-level locality. This limited its mechanisms, institutions, organizational models, autonomy, dynamism, and creativity.

After Resolution 98 took effect, what major changes did you think happened to Thu Duc City?

– Previously, Ho Chi Minh City had some decentralization and authorization mechanisms for Thu Duc City, but they were limited in scope. During the process of building Resolution 98 of the National Assembly, Ho Chi Minh City proposed and proposed to build a new mechanism, decentralizing and delegating more strongly to Thu Duc City.

The specific mechanisms and policies in Resolution 98 have allowed the model of a city directly under Ho Chi Minh City to be decentralized and delegated some contents that were previously under the State management authority of departments and branches. The Resolution also has some contents to create more initiative in organizing the apparatus of Thu Duc City, building and adjusting planning, budget, etc.

Thu Duc City has actually only been a city for over a year, since Resolution 98 took effect.

Dr. Tran Du Lich, Chairman of the Advisory Council for the implementation of Resolution 98

Since then, a series of projects that were waiting for departments and branches to adjust planning and grant licenses have also been transferred to Thu Duc City. These are stepping stones for Thu Duc City to develop strongly and move towards achieving the great expectations placed on its shoulders.

As someone who has been following the implementation of Resolution 98 in Ho Chi Minh City, I think that Thu Duc City has quickly and effectively implemented specific mechanisms and policies. Not only the contents of decentralization and authorization, Thu Duc City also takes advantage of and mobilizes social resources to create a number of welfare projects, create landscape highlights and improve the urban appearance such as the Saigon Riverside Park located in the Thu Thiem New Urban Area.

Tools to remove infrastructure weaknesses

The infrastructure bottlenecks of Thu Duc City have been mentioned recently. Compared to the great expectations of the people, do you think that Thu Duc City is slow in overcoming this problem?

– I think that with its current position, role and potential, the infrastructure, especially the traffic infrastructure of Thu Duc City, is at an extremely weak level. Without having to compare it with other cities in the world, we can easily see this when placing Thu Duc City next to major cities in the country.

A typical example is Da Nang, if not counting Hoang Sa island district and Hoa Vang district, this place is only about 20km2 larger than Thu Duc City. However, the traffic infrastructure of Da Nang City compared to Thu Duc City is a very far distance.

Infrastructure, especially traffic infrastructure, of Thu Duc City is extremely weak compared to its position, role and potential (Photo: Hai Long).

In Thu Duc City, in addition to the traffic projects managed by this locality, there are other projects of scale and authority of Ho Chi Minh City, even inter-regional projects under the responsibility of the Central Government, such as Ring Road 3. The issue of investment resources to resolve infrastructure shortcomings is also a problem that Ho Chi Minh City, Thu Duc City, and related agencies have raised fiercely.

We clearly see that there is always a huge gap between the role and potential of Thu Duc City's urban infrastructure. Many housing projects, developed residential areas, and urban areas in Thu Duc City, even though completed, have not attracted residents, due to the reason that the technical infrastructure and social infrastructure are not complete, not properly invested, or are behind schedule.

This bottleneck has prevented Thu Duc City from taking advantage of its existing momentum for logistics development. Other sectors are also affected by high logistics costs.

Based on the potentials, strengths, limitations and shortcomings mentioned above, in your opinion, what should Thu Duc City and its agencies do soon to create change and breakthroughs?

– In terms of mechanism and policy, Thu Duc City has a strong legal framework with Resolution 98, which is decentralized and delegated in many areas. But we need to remember that the mechanism of Thu Duc City has only been loosened for about a year, and there will still be shortcomings when applied in practice.

What Thu Duc City needs to do is invest more in its apparatus, improve the quality of its staff to be able to operate a city of over one million people, with a very large economic scale and capable of performing decentralized and authorized tasks. With an economic scale and population equal to many provinces combined, but I think that Thu Duc City's apparatus is not commensurate in both quality and quantity.

Regarding infrastructure shortcomings, we cannot rush to create immediate changes. Through monitoring, I see that Thu Duc City has made efforts with Ho Chi Minh City to find solutions, but 3-4 years since its establishment is not enough time for the locality to resolve the problems.

Since its establishment, Thu Duc has had to carry out two tasks in parallel: developing new urban areas while renovating old urban areas, and handling the backlog of previous phases. Many problems are beyond the capacity of Thu Duc City and require the efforts of Ho Chi Minh City, even requiring support from the central level.

Recently, Thu Duc City has actively coordinated with agencies and submitted to the Government the Thu Duc City Construction Planning Project to 2045, with a vision to 2060. As far as I know, this planning is about to be approved.

After having the planning project, Thu Duc will have a very important tool to make detailed planning adjustments, form future projects and create a premise for development. This is also the basis for the locality to speed up the progress of projects and handle existing backlogs.

In addition, Thu Duc City has an advantage that other places do not have, which is the potential for real estate market development. I hope that at some point, the Central Government will approve Ho Chi Minh City and Thu Duc City to pilot a financial tool to combat land speculation, which is to tax houses and land secondarily.

Thu Duc City has an advantage that other places do not have: the potential for real estate market development (Photo: Hai Long).

With this planning and financial tool, Thu Duc City will unlock huge resources through the management, regulation and sanitization of the real estate market. Previously, Ho Chi Minh City proposed this content, but it was not approved.

I believe that when the available potentials and advantages are combined with the necessary tools, Thu Duc City will resolve bottlenecks, complete and put into operation a series of infrastructure works and traffic projects. At that time, the city within Ho Chi Minh City will create a worthy breakthrough in both socio-economic and urban appearance.

Thank you!

Dantri.com.vn

Source: https://dantri.com.vn/xa-hoi/viec-tp-thu-duc-can-lam-de-tao-dot-pha-thuc-day-tang-truong-cho-tphcm-20241111115625460.htm