The Limassol District Local Government Organisation has identified around 1,000 unsafe buildings across the district and is calling for stronger legal powers to deal with them, its General Manager said, as the city continues to record intense construction activity.
Socrates Metaxas told Phileleftheros that the DLGO inherited approximately 700 dangerous buildings from previous authorities when it took over responsibility for the area. A survey since then has pushed the total to around 1,000. Of those, approximately 40 have been prioritised as particularly dangerous and flagged for immediate intervention.
“Primary responsibility for maintaining buildings lies with their owners,” Metaxas said. He added that the ideal scenario would be for the organisation to have the power to enter premises immediately and seal them off, regardless of the owners’ objections.
The problem, he said, is that current legislation does not give the DLGO the tools it needs for swift action — including the ability to cut off electricity and water supplies or to order the compulsory evacuation of a building.
The warning comes as Limassol’s construction sector shows no sign of slowing. Around 1,000 new applications for planning and building permits enter the system every month, Metaxas said, most of them for apartment blocks, including tall buildings and towers. The bulk of applications come from the wider urban area stretching from Moni and Parekklisia to Episkopi.
“Limassol has the distinction of approving applications with a very high buildable floor area, partly because of the presence of tall buildings — though the picture is very different in rural areas,” he said.
More tall buildings are in the pipeline. Metaxas said applications have already been submitted and others are being prepared, with particular interest from property owners along the Aktaia coastal road. No zone in Limassol has been designated exclusively for tall buildings, he said; each application is assessed against legislation, the area’s capacity and existing infrastructure.
Backlog nearly cleared
When the DLGO was established on July 1, 2024, it inherited around 8,500 pending cases alongside the flow of new applications. Around two-thirds have since been resolved.
“Our goal is to have completed all the cases we inherited by the end of this year, so that we can move into a period of full normality,” Metaxas said.
Staffing has also been a focus. The organisation expects to have around 500 employees by year-end, with full training and integration into operations as the target. Any expansion of the DLGO’s responsibilities — such as managing water services in rural areas or shared building management — would require further staff increases, Metaxas said.
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