From Mr G. Camilleri

The approval of the Mistra Village redevelopment has confirmed many voters’ fears that the much publicised Mepa reform was just hogwash and is never really going to happen.

Leaving aside for the moment the many other serious issues that plague this project, these are some of the hard facts regarding the acute traffic constipation that we will be facing at Xemxija for many years to come, thanks to this redevelopment.

The developer estimates that there will be 97 (yes, ninety seven) truckloads of waste a day for eight months using Xemxija Hill during the excavation phase. No mention is made of the same 97 empty trucks that will have to get to Mistra Village in the first place, but they will be there as well, of course. This translates to one truck every two-and-a-half minutes that are going to be added to the already heavy traffic.

The excavation phase will be followed by the construction phase. The developer does not estimate how many trucks, cement mixers and other very heavy machinery will be used during this phase, but the duration is estimated at another seven months and there are sure to be many, many trucks again using this same road.

However, according to a developer’s statement and in an apparent contradiction to the above, the estimated duration of the Mistra redevelopment is going to be 48 months, so there seems to be some discrepancy in the projected time frames, which only increases the foreboding.

At the end of the construction phase, there will be an additional 2,200 parking spaces made available to the lucky new residents and they are all going to be using Xemxija Hill, together with the 23,000 vehicles already using this road every day. That is 25,200 per day, or an average of a bit more than 1,000 per hour. This is only an average – the figure is bound to be many times more at peak hours and many times less at night.

In fact, the Traffic Impact Statement – which is part of the Environmental Impact Assessment – found that the impact on traffic would be “major”, particularly at the roundabout at the top of Xemxija Hill, and that traffic problems already existed and the roundabout would be “saturated” once the project was in operation. In other words, the traffic created by the project will render the road practically unusable. The congestion will start at the Mellieha Roundabout and will carry on as far as the Xemxija Roundabout in both directions for three kilometres. This is Xemxija Hell and we are going to live four years or more of large-scale disruption to traffic that will have, in Mepa-speak, a major negative impact on local commercial activity, tourism and the general public wellbeing.

It was Decision Day at Mepa. A presentation by Mepa staff went into every detail of the Environmental Impact Assessment prepared by the developer’s consultants. Much of the two-hour-long presentation was spent creating a feel-good feeling by promoting the magnanimity of the developer in dropping the height of the tower from 23 floors to 11 floors, whilst minimising the negative impact of dust (deemed as minor) and noise (temporary) on the residents and showing distorted misleading photo montages. The EIA also pointed out that the project will have a major negative visual impact on views from all around, particularly from Mistra Bay, and that the Traffic Impact Statement found that the project would create unsustainable traffic congestion for four years.

The members of the Mepa board did not even touch on, let alone discuss, the traffic. Nor did they discuss the

pollution or the major negative visual impact. In a surreal Kafkaesque mise en scène, the whole issue was decided in five minutes flat and the

permit granted. It is incomprehensible to me how a responsible board could have glossed over some very serious objections to a project by simply ignoring them. It was an arrogant declaration that the Mistra Village project was going ahead no matter what lesser mortals might feel to be important.

Who does the Mepa board think it is kidding? Has the Prime Minister already taken Mepa under his wing, or do we need to wait some more time before the reforms are implemented? And if so, why were such monstrous decisions not postponed until such time as the reforms have been put in place?

George Camilleri

SALINA BAY