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New rules in the PDM of Fornos de Algodres and Santa Marta de Penaguião: what to confirm before you proceed
The Diário da República of 15 September carries two territorial management instruments. In Fornos de Algodres, Aviso n.º 22787/2026/2 publishes the 1st amendment to the 1st revision of the PDM. In Santa Marta de Penaguião, Aviso n.º 22813/2026/2 publishes the 2nd revision, in full. Both take effect from 16 September 2026.
The two cases are not the same ― one municipality amended its plan, the other replaced it ― but the practical outcome converges: the set of documents that determines what can be done on a plot has changed. From 16 September, anyone holding an assessment based solely on the previous plan should confirm that its underlying assumptions still hold.
Fornos de Algodres: alignment with the new land classification rules
The amendment was promoted to adapt the PDM to the land classification and qualification rules arising from Lei n.º 31/2014, from the Regime Jurídico dos Instrumentos de Gestão Territorial and from Decreto Regulamentar n.º 15/2015, and to introduce corrections and changes identified during the period in which the first revision was in force. The Municipal Assembly approved it on 3 February 2026.
The reach is considerable. Sixty articles and Anexo I were amended, 18 articles and a new Anexo II were added, several provisions were repealed, and the Regulation was republished in full. Among the drawings, the amendment covers the Planta de Ordenamento for land classification and qualification, the Carta do Património Cultural, the acoustic zoning and conflict zones drawing and the Estrutura Ecológica Municipal; among the condicionantes, the drawing of administrative easements and other restrictions, the Reserva Ecológica Nacional, the Reserva Agrícola Nacional e Aproveitamentos Hidroagrícolas, and rural fire risk management.
Two changes deserve a careful reading.
The Estrutura Ecológica Municipal, which already existed as an accompanying drawing, now formally forms part of the Plan's constitutive elements, as a Planta de Ordenamento in its own right.
The Planta de Condicionantes for forest stands run through by fire was also repealed. That repeal accompanies the transition to the cartographic and normative regime of the SGIFR. It does not remove the national rules on prevention and on the conditioning of building, which continue to apply regardless of how they are represented in the PDM. Nor, however, should it be read as leaving the former general regime for burnt areas intact, since that regime has itself been repealed.
Santa Marta de Penaguião: a full revision
Here there was no touching up: there was replacement. The Municipal Assembly approved the 2nd revision at an extraordinary session on 28 August, by majority, and the plan was published together with the Regulation and eight drawings across 32 sheets.
On the ordenamento side: land classification and qualification, heritage, safeguards and acoustic zoning. On the condicionantes side: the general condicionantes drawing, the Reserva Ecológica Nacional, the Áreas Prioritárias de Prevenção e Segurança and the Redes de Defesa.
Municipal fire risk mapping is not new in this municipality ― the previous plan already contained material on hazard and on burnt areas. What changes is the organisation: the material is now structured along SGIFR lines, with the priority prevention areas and the defence networks set out as condicionantes drawings in their own right. For anyone siting a house, a winery or tourist accommodation on a slope, these drawings become part of the set of elements to be checked before the siting is fixed.
The Regulation has a title of its own on administrative easements and restrictions in the public interest, and a land use chapter with specific articles on the reclassification of solo rústico into solo urbano, on general building conditions, on determining the building capacity of a plot and on urban and landscape integration. Article 14 must be read together with the RJIGT: it establishes local conditions, but it does not give the owner an individual right to have the land reclassified.
What this article does not tell you
A note of honesty. Knowing that the Planta de Ordenamento has changed is not the same as knowing what changed on a particular plot. The answer to "has my land gained or lost building capacity?" only exists once the previous mapping is overlaid on the new one and the land category, the applicable indices and the restrictions bearing on that plot are compared. This article gives the framework; it is no substitute for that overlay.
What to confirm before you proceed
There are three dimensions, and they need to be checked together.
The land category the plot has been placed in on the new Planta de Ordenamento, and the articles of the republished Regulation that correspond to it.
The restrictions that bear on it in the new drawings: RAN, REN, easements and, in Santa Marta de Penaguião, the defence networks and priority prevention areas. These restrictions can be every bit as decisive as the land category itself.
And the status of what you already hold. A private feasibility study based on the previous plan should be revisited. A favourable prior information decision in force, by contrast, may retain binding effects under article 17 of the RJUE, so each case has to be looked at individually.
CertiAmb carries out planning feasibility analysis for land across mainland Portugal, including reading the applicable PDM, comparing it with the previous version where that matters, and identifying the restrictions that bear on the plot. If you own land in Fornos de Algodres or Santa Marta de Penaguião, talk to us: geral@certiamb.com · +351 910 441 470.
See also our Planning feasibility service and the articles The PDM and rural land: what you can (and cannot) build on your plot and Building next to the forest: the fire defence rules that condition your land.
Read Aviso n.º 22787/2026/2 (Fornos de Algodres) in Diário da República →
Read Aviso n.º 22813/2026/2 (Santa Marta de Penaguião) in Diário da República →