An application to extend St Vincent de Paul to increase the number of residents by 490 is set to be decided this Thursday by the Planning authority.
The application is to construct a home for the elderly including a basement and four residential blocks to house 490 residents and a car park within the SVPR long term care facility complex. The whole site shall occupy an area of circa 16,500 square metres, the case officer's report read. The site area around these blocks will include the following: Landscaping around the blocks and the periphery of the site area; A chapel; A security room; Bowser bay; Oxygen plant area.
The 490 residents, the case officer's report reads, will be housed in around 190 rooms.
The project itself has been at the heart of a scandal. Times of Malta reported that a tender morphed the contract into the construction of this extension which was outside the scope of the tender call, after government had entered into new negotiations with the consortium which had won the tender. They reported that in return for the construction, government had agreed to issue a €270 million direct order for the management of the extension.
The case officer explains that the site in question is currently occupied by a few vacant rural structures, the SVP mortuary and a substation. The architect stated that the lower part of the site is government-owned land leased to third parties, and the proposal includes the demolition of these structures.
Two of the blocks will be five storeys high, with a height of 20.3 metres, facing Triq Hal Qormi. The other two blocks are proposed to be three floors high with a height of 12.40 metres. The proposal encroaches beyond the land identified in the South Malta Local Plan for the allocation of social and community facilities. The Architect submitted a justification wherein it was stated that the area encroaching beyond the boundary designated for social and community facilities is around 600 square metres, and this was required since Transport Malta indicated that the entity intends to change the road alignment for Triq Hal-Qormi and due to site restrictions the residential blocks had to be shifted slightly.
The project description statement reads that "as a consequence of Malta's aging population, authorities are being requested to further expand the number of residences available for the elderly. The site in question is located in an area designated for social and community facilities, adjacent to a complex utilised for the care of the elderly. Moreover, clearance from the Directorate for Health Care Standards and the Department of Environmental Health was submitted.
As for parking, the report reads that a revised proposal includes the removal of a surface parking area which was originally proposed. From a parking provision point of view, there is a shortfall of 27 spaces below the minimum standard requirement of 295 spaces. Although it was noted that the standard rate of one space per employee (there will be a maximum of 176 employees on the premises at any one time according to the Transport Impact Assessment) is excessive for this particular case. "A rate of 1 per 3 employees, similar to that for employees in hotels and other commercial premises, would be more reasonable. In this regard the parking requirement would be 123 for the number of beds plus 59 for the number of employees, resulting in a total requirement of 182 spaces. The proposed 268 would be an over-provision of 86 car parking provision, which is considered acceptable."
The case officer recommended that the project be approved.