The development includes three tower blocks – two commercial podia of 10 and 12 floors, and a 15 floor residential tower. The different sizes of the towers counterbalance the road’s incline.

The development incorporates 70 apartments, a restaurant, a pharmacy, a mini-market and two showrooms as well as a landscaped area. There will also be three underlying floors with some 169 parking spaces.

There were hardly any objections to the development. In fact it was described by Paola mayor Ray Attard, present at the board meeting, as the first quality development of its kind for the locality in years.

The project was proposed by JPM Brothers some three years ago as a regular three-storey, 54-unit apartment block. However the planning directorate encouraged the developers to explore the possibility of building a high profile development instead, through the use of the Floor Area Ratio (FAR) policy.

The policy stipulates that under certain conditions the developers may be allowed to reduce the built footprint of their development and instead achieve space through erecting a tower block. The height-per-footprint ratio is worked out with a benchmark mathematical equation. In fact, 69 per cent of the site will be open space, while the remaining 31 per cent will be developed, as opposed to the former 100 per cent.

A number of impact assessment reports were commissioned to evaluate the logistical and aesthetic impact the building may have on the area, including a large number of photomontages from different angles.

As part of the conditions for the permit, the Mepa board included a contribution, on part of the company, of Lm15,000. Mepa will use these funds, in consultation with the Paola local council, for improvements of the development’s immediate surroundings, such as for the resurfacing of the roads in the vicinity of the site or the landscaping of a nearby green area.