The recent decision by the Swieqi local council, which overturned a decision taken by the previous equally-PN-led council under pressure from ADT and turned Triq is-Sidra back to two-way traffic, has been termed dangerous by residents.

They pointed out to this newspaper that the road is dangerous both because of a bend towards its end, which makes it impossible for drivers to see who is crossing the road beyond the bend, and also because many non-residents pass through to avoid the traffic lights at the entrance to Paceville and the other traffic lights near Jessie’s Bar.

As already reported in this paper, one of the PN councillors who voted in favour of the road returning back to two-way is councillor Gordon Shepard who owns a supermarket on this road and who claimed that when the road became one-way it had negatively affected his business.

In the end, the decision taken by the previous council was reversed by three votes to two – the three votes being by mayor Carmen Said, Mr Shepard and councillor Paul Fenech while Labour councillor Mario Fava and AD councillor Rene Rossignaud voted against. PN councillor Gregory Brincat, who had argued against returning the road to two-way, left the sitting just before the vote.

The only concession allowed by the majority was that parking would now be in an a-symmetrical manner, so that cars will allow cars coming from the opposite direction to pass.

Mr Fava told this newspaper that around two years ago he had proposed that Triq is-Sidra be one-way going towards Tal-Ibrag and that the narrow road between Triq is-Swieqi and Wied il-Ghomor have cars travelling in the opposite direction to today – that is, entering Swieqi rather than exiting in order to lead directly into Triq is-Swieqi without using Triq is-Sidra.