Plans for the site of the former Jerma Palace Hotel will not see an emphasis placed on building height, meaning that Marsascala’s St. Thomas Tower will be visible from the sea, the locality’s mayor Mario Calleja has been told.
Asked about what he would like to see happen to the Jerma Hotel site, which has been abandoned since the hotel shuttered some 15 years ago, Calleja told The Malta Independent that he was expecting a “very nice project” to take place there.
He said that while he does not have specific details about the plans for the site, he had been informed that the planned development would not see major building heights, to the point that St. Thomas Tower – which is across the road from the site – would be visible from the sea after the project is completed.
Calleja stressed that the people do not want a “gigantesque” application on the site, noting that there had been three such development applications which the council had all expressed itself against.
“We want there to be development, but it has to be sustainable and it cannot inconvenience the people who live there,” Calleja, who represents the PL on the council, said.
The Jerma Palace Hotel was an important part of Marsascala’s economy until it shut down in 2007, and has been left abandoned ever since.
There have been a number of applications filed on the site since then.
In 2008, the then owners of the site – the Montebello brothers behind JPM Construction – had filed an application for a new hotel and blocks of apartments on the site – but this fell flat after then Prime Minister Lawrence Gonzi said that only a hotel, and not apartments, could be developed on the site.
Another attempt was made in 2016 by developer Charles Camilleri through his company Porto Notos Ltd to demolish the existing hotel and replace it with a massive high-rise development made up of two residential towers, one of 44 and another of 32 storeys, together with a 22 storey hotel on the site.
The proposal – which Calleja coined ‘the Three Towers’ during his interview with this newsroom – was later downscaled to units of 12 and 13 storeys respectively and has since been withdrawn.
It was withdrawn because Camilleri had sold the site to another developer – Gozitan property magnate Joseph Portelli – in a deal reportedly worth €90 million.
Back in 2016, PN councillor Charlot Cassar had alternatively suggested that the government but the Jerma Hotel land and turn it into an open space to be used by the public.
Portelli has since said that he wants to transform the site into a complex of 130 apartments, a 500-room hotel and a public square in front of the St. Thomas Tower.
He has said that the project will not be a high-rise, but a development brief approved by Cabinet around this time last year does permit a development of up to eight storeys. That development brief also introduces the possibility of residential development, after the 2006 local plan had identified the site as one which should mainly be used for tourist accommodation.
The exact plans and designs for Portelli’s proposed development on the site have yet to be revealed, as an application for the project is yet to be filed with the Planning Authority.