2023 Laws of Puerto Rico › TITLE TWENTY-ONE - Municipalities (§§ 1-4 — 6756) › Subtitle 6 - Autonomous Municipalities (§§ 4001 — 4990-4990j) › Chapter 225 - Territorial Ordinance (§§ 4601 — 4627) › § 4601 - Definitions

The following terms and phrases shall have the meaning indicated hereinafter, when used or referred to in this chapter, unless the context clearly indicates otherwise:
(a) Regulations and Permits Administration.— Shall mean the public agency with operational functions created by virtue of Act No. 76 of June 24, 1975, known as the “Organic Act of the Regulations and Permits Administration”.
(b) Land Administration.— Shall mean the public agency created by §§ 311 et seq. of Title 23, known as the “Puerto Rico Land Administration Act”.
(c) Advance plan.— Shall mean the document that summarizes and illustrates the most important preliminary decisions and recommendations of a territorial ordinance plan under development.
(d) Dedication.— Means any free donation to the Commonwealth of Puerto Rico, its public agencies and municipalities for the public use of lands, structures or any type of real rights thereon; these donations could be required as a condition for the approval of a project or the implementation of an ordinance plan.
(e) Department of Housing.— Shall mean the public agency created by §§ 441 et seq. of Title 3.
(f) Amendment to the ordinance plan.— Shall mean any minor modification of the geographic limits of a plan to respond to new technical information or of its unavailable context when originally drafted and that said change has no significant impact upon the area where it occurs.
(g) Exception.— Shall mean any discretionary authorization to use a property or construct a structure which is different from those usually allowed in an area by the ordinance regulations; provided, that said use or construction is allowed by an exception provision established in the regulations themselves, and provided that it meets the requirements or conditions established for said authorization.
(h) Piece of land.— Shall mean any parcel of land, plot, real estate property or lot whose identity and description are filed in a real estate registry.
(i) Puerto Rico Planning Board.— Shall mean the public agency with a regulatory function created by virtue of §§ 62 et seq. of Title 23, known as the “Puerto Rico Planning Board Organic Act”.
(j) Parceling.— Shall mean any division or subdivision of a lot, plat or parcel of land into two (2) or more parts, for sale, transfer, assignment, conveyance, lease, donation, usufruct, use, census, trust, division of estate or community property, or for any other related or similar transaction; the establishment of a tenancy in common on a lot, plat or parcel of land where specific lots are assigned to the joint proprietors, as well as for the construction of one or more buildings; it also includes urbanization, as used to the present in the legislation of Puerto Rico and also as simple segregation.
(k) Simple parceling.— Shall mean any parceling of land in which all the urbanization works are already constructed, or in which said works are very simple and do not exceed ten (10) lots—including remnants—taking into consideration for the computation of the ten (10) lots the subdivision of the property as originally formed as well as the subdivisions of the remnants of the original property.
(l) Office of Territorial Ordinance.— Shall mean the office whose function and responsibility is to handle all matters pertaining to the planning of the territory of the corresponding municipality or municipalities.
(m) Permits Office.— Shall mean the agency, dependency or administrative unit of one or several municipalities whose function and responsibility is to consider and resolve all matters pertaining to authorizations and permits for the use, construction or installation of billboards and notices in the corresponding municipality or municipalities.
(n) Territorial ordinance.— Shall mean the organization and regulation of the use, the real estate and the structures of a territory in order to arrange it in a useful, efficient and aesthetic manner for the purpose of promoting social and economic development, obtaining the optimum use of the land and improving the quality of life of its present and future inhabitants.
(o) Area plan.— Shall mean the ordinance plan to provide for the use of the land in those areas of the municipality that require special attention.
(p) Extension plan.— Shall mean the ordinance plan to provide for the use of the urbanizable land programmed by the municipality to be converted into urban land.
(q) Ordinance plan.— Shall mean the plan of a municipality to provide for the use of the land within its territorial limits and promote the social and economic welfare of the population to include the territorial plan, the extension plan and the area plan.
(r) Land use plan.— Shall mean the public policy document adopted by the Planning Board which shall, depending on its geographic scope and purpose, establish the distribution, location, extension and intensity of the uses of the land and other elements such as the infrastructure for urban, rural and agricultural purposes and for the development of the mining and timber industries, the conservation and protection of natural resources, the areas of recreation, transportation and communications, the production of energy and for residential, commercial, industrial, educational, public and institutional activities, among others.
(s) Territorial plan.— Shall mean the ordinance plan encompassing the total territorial extension of a municipality which sets forth and provides the public policy regarding its development and the use of the land.
(t) Soil classification design.— Shall mean the design or series of designs that are part of the territorial plan and that establishes the limits of urban and rural lands and the urbanizable land.
(u) Ordinance design.— Shall mean the design that is part of an ordinance plan and that graphically delimits the geographic application of the ordinance regulations and the public policies on land use.
(v) Urbanizing process.— Shall mean any development which transforms non-urban land with works such as the development of roads, the establishment of aqueducts and sewers and electrical energy sources, land movement and the development of grouped structures which provide the characteristics of an urban landscape.
(w) Extension program.— Shall mean the program in the territorial plan that quantifies and qualifies the urban development needs in land to be urbanized and serves as the foundation of an Extension Plan.
(x) Development project.— Shall mean any man-made physical change or modification of an improved or unimproved lot, plot, parcel of land or structure, including, without it being construed as a limitation, the segregation of lots, the construction, enlargement, or alteration of structures, the increased intensity in the use of the land or the structures and projects for the use and alteration of the land regarding areas such as agriculture, mining, dredging, landfills, deforestation, leveling, paving, excavation and drilling.
(y) Urbanization project.— Shall mean any project pertaining to “urbanizing”, as this term is defined in this section.
(z) Reserve.— Shall mean every determination or action of a competent government body through which private land is segregated for public use.
(aa) Ordinance regulations.— Shall mean the provisions which set forth the norms for the use of land applicable to an ordinance plan and shall include norms regarding the use and intensity of use of the land and the characteristics of the structures and public spaces as well as norms concerning parceling and other determinations of territorial ordinance relative to the processes, mechanisms, uses and other related factors.
(bb) Revision of the ordinance plan.— Shall mean the collection of new data, inventories and needs, the declaration of new policies or the promulgation of regulations which significantly substitute, broaden or limit an ordinance plan in effect.
(cc) Suburb.— Shall mean a specialized city area of low density development in which there is a segregation and separation of uses.
(dd) Land.— Shall mean the surface of the earth in relation to its use, to include both the land as well as the bodies of water, the space above and the area below them.
(ee) Rural land.— Shall mean a land classification in the territorial plan and shall be constituted by the land that the territorial plan considers must be expressly protected from the urbanizing process due to, among other reasons, its present or potential agricultural and cattle raising value; its natural value and its present or potential recreational value, as well as from risks to the public safety or health, or because they are not necessary to fulfill the expectations for urban growth in a foreseeable future of eight (8) years. This land classification shall include the categories comprising common rural lands as well as especially protected rural lands.
(ff) Urban land.— Shall mean a land classification in the territorial plan and shall be constituted by the lands that have road access, water and electrical energy supplies and any other infrastructure needed to carry out the administrative, economic and social activities conducted in this land and that are included within areas consolidated by buildings.
(gg) Urbanizable land.— Shall mean a land classification in the territorial plan and shall be constituted by the land that the territorial plan declares as suitable to be urbanized on the basis of the need of land to accommodate the growth of the municipality in an eight (8) year period and comply with the goals and objectives of the territorial ordinance. This land classification includes the categories of programmed and non-programmed urbanizable lands.
(hh) Urbanization.— Shall mean any segregation, division or subdivision of a plat of land, that in view of the works to be carried out for the formation of lots, is not included in the term “simple parceling”, as defined in this section, and shall further include the development of a plat of land for the construction of any building or buildings of eleven (11) or more dwellings; the development of facilities for commercial, industrial, institutional or recreational use which exceed two thousand (2,000) square meters; or the development of facilities in land encompassing an area of over four thousand (4,000) square meters.
(ii) Land use.— Shall mean the final use to which a piece of land is put and in relation to the ordinance plans this terms shall include the use of the land as well as the characteristics of the structures and the spaces between these, be it public or private.
(jj) Communal use.— Shall mean any physical facility to provide a community with the basic services to be used to carry out its operations and achieve its general welfare. These facilities may include, among others, business establishments and schools or educational, cultural, recreational, sports, health, security and transportation facilities, as well as provide for the maintenance of the foundations, the collection of solid wastes, the upkeep of the public roads, and infrastructure services, such as water, sewage, road networks, telephone and electricity. Among these communal uses those which provide for the needs of the municipality in general and are identified as general must be singled out.
(kk) Variation in use.— Shall mean any authorization to use a property for a use not permitted by the restrictions imposed on a zone or district, granted to avoid damages to a property where, due to extraordinary circumstances, the strict application of the regulations would be the same as confiscating the property; that it is granted because of the acknowledged or urgent need for its use by a community due to the particular circumstances of said community that cannot be met if said variation is not granted; or that it is granted to fulfill an non-deferrable public need.
(ll) Variation in construction or in the installation of billboards and notices.— Shall mean any authorization granted for the construction of a structure or part thereof or for the installation of billboards or notices, that does not meet the requirements of the established regulations and ordinance plans, but that due to the condition of the lot, its special location or particular use, faces practical difficulties and deserves special consideration, ensuring that no damage is done to neighboring properties. The variation may not affect the characteristics proper to a district and its outcome may not have the effect of converting one district into another.
(mm) Affordable housing.— Shall mean any housing unit for those families that, due to their income characteristics, are prevented from acquiring or do not qualify for seeking housing in the formal private sector.
History —Aug. 30, 1991, No. 81, § 13.003; Oct. 29, 1992, No. 84, § 60.