Publikacje

In late February 2026 a draft bill was published on the Government Legislation Centre (RCL)’s website (bearing reference number UD316) amending the Act on Spatial Planning and Development and certain related acts.

The proposal is largely corrective and implementing in nature: on the one hand, it extends some key deadlines of the recent reform of the planning system; on the other hand, it clarifies and simplifies certain planning instruments (in particular the ZPI procedure) and resolves some technical issues (e.g. regarding so-called areas of downtown development). Below we discuss the most important proposed changes from the perspective of investors and practitioners.

1. General plans – another deadline extension

The most significant change for communes is a further extension, albeit by just two months this time, until 31 August 2026, of the deadline for completing the final step in the implementation process of general plans, i.e. the deadline to draw up and adopt general plans. (Adoption triggers the expiry of communes’ existing “studies of conditions and directions of spatial development.” The current deadline is 30 June 2026.) In practice, by temporarily extending the force of existing land use documents, it reduces the risk of a regulatory limbo situation arising – leading to a halt in investment activity – in communes that are not able to complete the procedures necessary for the adoption of general plans by the end of June 2026. The explanatory memorandum says that the two-month deadline extension will synchronise the deadline for general plans’ adoption with that for the expenditure of funds from the National Recovery Plan (KPO) that are paying for the implementation of the planning system reform.

2. Lex Deweloper’s lifetime extended

Under the draft bill, the “Act of 5 July 2018 on facilitations in the preparation and implementation of housing projects and accompanying investments”, known colloquially as Lex Deweloper, which is a time-limited law, will have its period of validity, or expiry date, extended by two months, too,  i.e. until 1 September 2026. It should be remembered that, according to applicable transitional provisions, where a complete and correct application has been submitted to the commune for the adoption of an ULIM resolution (“Resolution determining the location of a housing project” to be built based on the provisions of Lex Deweloper) before the expiry date of Lex Deweloper, an ULIM resolution regarding the project can be adopted even after Lex Deweloper’s expiry, subject to certain changes and restrictions provided for in Article 76 of the “Act of 7 July 2023 amending the Act on Spatial Planning and Development and certain other acts.”

3. Decisions on development conditions (WZ) – possibility of obtaining them further restricted

The single biggest novelty, introduced on the initiative of communes and generally unfavorable for investors, is a further limitation of the possibility of obtaining a decision on development conditions (“WZ”). It should be remembered that as a result of the reform of the planning system, the possibilities of issuing new WZ decisions are already very limited, confined to situations where: (1) the plot is not covered by the applicable local plan, and at the same time (2) the commune has no general plan yet or, if it has one, the plot is located, in whole or in part, within an area designated in the general plan as an area of supplementary development and some additional conditions specified in the act are met.

The draft bill restricts the possibility of obtaining WZ decisions still further, in two ways: (1) a WZ decision will be issued only to an applicant who holds the so-called right to dispose of the property for construction purposes (within the meaning of the Construction Law), as demonstrated by a statement submitted by the applicant made under pain of criminal liability – which is currently  required only when applying for a building permit or when making a notification of construction works; and (2) the provision that allows a WZ decision concerning the same plot to be issued to more than one applicant is to be deleted. According to the explanatory memorandum, the changes are being introduced at the request of local governments (communes) in order to prevent situations where WZ decisions are sought “only to increase the value of the property or to explore potential investment opportunities”, which put extra burden on communes’ architecture departments and is allegedly “often a source of social conflicts”. In practice, this means that an investor intending to apply for a WZ decision will have to agree with the owner and obtain from them the appropriate “right to dispose of the property for construction purposes”, e.g. in the form of a mandatory consent to such disposal, and therefore it will no longer be possible to obtain a WZ decision without the cooperation of the owner or another entity that has a title to the property (which admittedly was not very common).

It is not at all clear whether the removal of the provision that explicitly allows a WZ decision in respect of the same plot to be issued to several different applicants will result in the automatic exclusion of such a possibility. The legal basis for refusing to issue a WZ decision for the same plot to another applicant could be Article 156 paragraph 1 (3) of the Code of Civil Procedure, which prohibits (indirectly) the issuance of a decision in a case previously resolved by another final decision. The problem is that the consistent application of this provision in cases concerning WZ decisions would mean that it would not be possible to issue another WZ decision for the same plot, not only to another applicant, but also to “the same” applicant, i.e. an entity that has already been issued with at least one WZ decision concerning the plot (for example where the owner, having already received a WZ decision regarding the location of a residential project on the plot, would still like to explore and/or secure the possibility of locating a commercial project on it). Such a restrictive interpretation of the cited provision of the Code of Civil Procedure is currently used when issuing building permits: in the case of the existence of an earlier, as yet “unconsumed”, building permit for a given plot, the authorities make the issuance of a new permit conditional upon revocation or expiry of the previous one. If this practice were to be applied to the issuance of WZ decisions, it would be much more painful from the point of view of investors’ needs than making their issuance dependent on the possession of the right to dispose of the property for construction purposes.

If the proposed changes are enacted and enter into force, it will probably take some time before authorities develop a uniform practice, and until this practice is tested against court decisions. The discussed changes concerning WZ decisions would enter into force only from 1 January 2027 and, importantly, would not apply to proceedings for the issuance of WZ decisions initiated before that date and pending as at that date. Therefore, owners of plots not covered by applicable local plans who would like to secure development conditions for alternative uses – where this is permissible in the light of the provisions of the general plan – would still have some time to do so.

4. Integrated Investment Plans (ZPI) – key changes

Another major category of changes concerns integrated investment plans (ZPI), a planning instrument that has been used relatively rarely so far and which is supposed to replace solutions offered by Lex Deweloper, but which is not limited to residential projects. Some of the proposals include:

1. the possibility of limiting the scope of the ZPI where the construction project supplementing the main project can be executed on the basis of the applicable local plan – which would eliminate the need to undertake planning processes merely to copy arrangements already present in the local plan to the ZPI;
2. the possibility for the commune to process a ZPI project, up to a certain stage, on the basis of an urban and architectural concept, instead of a draft ZPI – the commune council would be authorised to require the investor to attach such an urban and architectural concept to the ZPI application, as well as to exempt the investor – in certain cases – from the obligation to attach a draft ZPI;
3. the possibility to act, at the beginning of the ZPI procedure, on the basis of “assumptions” to an urban planning agreement – specifying, in particular, the obligations of the parties, deadlines, and collaterals – instead of a fully-fledged draft urban planning agreement (“assumptions” would be subject e.g. to a public consultation exercise, and the draft urban planning agreement would be drawn up at the end of the procedure);
4. the possibility for the commune council to withdraw its decision to start preparing a ZPI – until the conclusion of the urban planning agreement – which would end the “negotiation” phase and help avoid long-running uncertainty about the fate of the investor’s application;
5. the commune council’s decision to start preparing a ZPI will remain valid regardless of the scope of subsequent changes to the original draft ZPI introduced during the planning procedure;
6. f) the introduction of an instructional deadline of 2 months for the commune council to adopt a resolution on a ZPI, and a similar deadline for the administrative courts to examine complaints and cassation appeals against ZPI;
7. Allowing the investor to finance the costs of the planning procedure related to ZPI early (e.g. in the form of advance payments), on the basis of a separate agreement concluded with the commune prior to the conclusion of the urban planning agreement.

5. Areas of downtown development – transferred to local plans and WZ

The draft bill clarifies the application of “areas of downtown development” – defined as “areas of compact, intensive residential and commercial development in or near a city centre” – which communes can optionally designate in their general plans. Such a designation enables the establishment of special rules for such an area, e.g. a lower required share of biologically active surface. But the main objective was to provide a basis for the application, when issuing building permits for construction projects in such areas, of the technical conditions for downtown development laid down in technical and construction regulations, e.g. concerning shading and sunlight. The problem, however, is that in principle, the general plan does not constitute a direct basis for building permit decisions. Therefore, the draft bill introduces a requirement for areas of downtown development designated in the general plan to be transferred to local plans and WZ decisions, which in turn will enable the application of the technical conditions for downtown development at the building permit stage.

Summary

The draft amendment continues the aims of the planning system reform and is mainly operational in nature, extending some deadlines (albeit not by much) and introducing corrections to the ZPI procedure. For investors, the most important proposals are: extension of Lex Deweloper’s lifetime by 2 months; new restrictions on obtaining WZ decisions; and practical procedural changes regarding ZPI.