From Mr J. Vella
The supermarket in Psaila Street (known as Triq il-Ferrovija) Santa Venera is causing several inconveniences to nearby residents, particularly to us who live in the vicinity of its rear exit in Parilja Street. Now, to add insult to injury, its owner is requesting Mepa to approve a further extension, which would make life in this road even more miserable.
During its operations, the supermarket unloads the merchandise with a fork lifter from trucks parked in front of our garages, thus locking us up in our houses. These trucks are left with their engines running (without driver) that pollute the air outside our windows. Even worse, we are also blocked in our homes by pallets left on the pavement in front of the doors to our homes. If this was not enough, some drivers also add to this insult by peeing in our drive-ins
Now, the owner of the supermarket has requested Mepa to renew a permit for an extension into a villa area. After being deceived a number of times, we have managed to lodge an objection after work on this project had already commenced.
Alas, the case officer report is now recommending the approval of the work without adequate loading and unloading bays. This goes against Mepa’s own policies to the detriment of the environment and us ‘minor’ citizens for the benefit of those who are well off.
For us residents this is unacceptable, as it goes against the principles of a better environment. We also believe that European standards are not being met.
We thus urge Mepa to abide by its mission to protect the environment when taking its decisions and to instruct the owners to erect a loading and unloading bay in the new extension site in Psaila Street where there is enough space to do so. It is also to be noted that the exit in Parilya Street from where the goods are off-loaded with fork lifters, was never shown on the site plan because this garage is under and part of the two maisonettes attached to it. This place was against the law interconnected with the supermarket.
Joe Vella
STA VENERA