The government has not shown enough “political will” to carry out its electoral manifesto pledge to turn the Victoria Lines into Malta’s first national trail, which would be crucial for its protection against vandalism, rambler and Victoria Lines Trail supporter Jane Caruana said.

Caruana is co-founder of the Facebook page, Friends of the Victoria Lines Trail, along with Ray Cachia Zammit, who has a passion for the history of fortifications, whom she met when she wrote her dissertation in 2017 for her Master’s Degree in Cultural Sustainability & Tourism from the University of Malta.

Caruana had met with the Labour Party before the election to discuss the idea of turning the Victoria Lines into Malta’s first national trail, which was initially received quite well, she told The Malta Independent on Sunday.

The government’s electoral manifesto promised that it plans to “create ecological corridors in two zones in Mellieha and another zone in the area of Victoria Lines, where the first national trail will be established to join the East and the West of the Victoria Lines”.

“It was in the electoral manifesto. In our eyes, the government committed black on white that in this legislature it will carry out this project.”

Although today meetings are taking place with the Environment Ministry to discuss this further it has not been spoken about publicly and she gets the feeling that this is not a “political priority”.

“At this point in time, there is not enough political will and I expect the government to have enough political will on a project like this because it is about time that the political priority changes.”

“While urban greening projects are important and I agree with them 100%... it is useless to carry out urban greening projects, while, in the meantime, we are rural greying.”

The Malta Independent on Sunday contacted Caruana to discuss the importance of establishing the Victoria Lines as a national trail and what this would entail.

Caruana said that the idea began when she initially wrote her dissertation entitled The Victoria Lines national trail: a proposal for the development and management of a new self-guided heritage trail and an innovative tourism product for Malta.

She later launched the Facebook page with Cachia Zammit to raise awareness about this trail and they also began conducting meetings with local councils, ministries, authorities, etc. “seeking someone to work on this project”.

She spoke very highly about the work that they have achieved through this Facebook page. “Considering we started out with no resources, we are getting a lot of things done.”

“In a nutshell, my research clearly showed that besides all the policies and laws that were enacted, for some reason, the Victoria Lines were lying in an abandoned state.”

She said that the Victoria Lines is a Grade 1 scheduled area, which is supposed to be the highest level of protection; however, she said that this was just “protection on paper”.

Benefits of a national trail

Asked what the national trail would entail, she said: “A national trail is a trail which due to its extent or size relative to the size of the country, can be considered to be of national importance.”

In the case of the Victoria Lines, it literally traverses Malta from East to West, “so it is of national importance in terms of size”.

Caruana went on to speak about the uniqueness of these fortifications. She pointed out how they follow a “geological fault, which cuts Malta in half”.

She added that the Victoria Lines does not only include infantry walls but also several fortification systems built by the British. The Victoria Lines also incorporates four forts, several batteries and entrenchments. She also said that the Victoria Lines passes through historical sites which date back before the time the British were in Malta.

She said that the British built it for defensive purposes but by the time they finished building it, military technology advanced and it was never used for the reasons it was built.

However, her theory, which can be found in her dissertation, is that “without them knowing they delineated a walking trail that passes through the nicest parts of the Maltese countryside”.

“Since it follows the grade fault, you always have a 360-degree panoramic view of the whole island.”

“As a whole, it is definitely of national importance, it merits protection, which goes beyond paper protection. One of the best ways to protect it is to officially state that this is a national trail. This would prevent somebody from interfering and deciding to get a permit to build a block of apartments.”

She added that for this trail to be established, more clearance work needs to take place although work has been carried out by Ambjent Malta under the Environment Ministry. She understood that this was important but now more regular maintenance is required.

Lengthy restoration works

Currently, restoration works are being carried out by the Restoration Directorate on the Victoria Lines, within the confines of Gharghur. Leading architect Ivana Farrugia told The Malta Independent last week that instances of vandalism, stealing and emergency restoration works have made the restoration process longer, as the limited number of qualified masonry would need to stop their work to conduct emergency works.

There were instances on the Victoria Lines in Mosta where workers had to return and clean vandalism from the walls that had been restored in 2019. Also, one month after the workers began work to restore the Victoria Lines in Gharghur, their tools were stolen.

In 2019, workers also had to pause their work and carry out emergency works to repair Fort Madliena, as a flank wall collapsed.

Asked about the lengthy restoration process and whether this was worth it, Caruana said: “My argument, in general, is that it is good to restore historical sites. But once this is restored, if left alone, it will eventually need to be restored again. You invested money to restore a historical building. What are you trying to get out of that money?”

Caruana said that if the path is cleared, the place is restored and it is advertised as a national trail, then the government will be accessing the niche market of ramblers who are seeking trekking holidays.

“The country would eventually get its return on the money it would have invested in restoration.”

She heavily praised the work of the Restoration Directorate. “I assure you that they know very well what they are doing and they are doing a very good job. To do something like this either you need a lot of human resources or a lot of time.”

She said that they have a very good relationship with the Restoration Directorate and Farrugia, the leading architect of the Victoria Lines Restoration.

She said that she approached Farrugia two or three years ago and invited her to walk along the Victoria Lines to get a better idea of all the problems that there are in certain areas, which they did.

Caruana described the work of the Restoration Directorate as being “very meticulous” and they studied the original fortifications to produce, as much as possible, the exact same structures.

Farrugia had said last week that the restoration process aims to “respect, as much as possible, the original configuration”.

This involved either retrieving the original stone which would have fallen into the valley or even having to use the same sized stone that the British used to restore the fortifications.

“This is not an easy process, add to this the lack of human resources.”

Vandalism

Pressed about the effect of vandalism and whether this was prevalent, Caruana said that it was and is “costing us money”.

Giving examples, she said that in the past, people would come in pick-up trucks and steal the stone from the infantry walls, to be used on their farmhouses or villas.

Caruana also mentioned hunters and trappers who would literally drill holes in the wall to set up poles with empty cans.

“Again that is vandalism, I've seen it myself near Falta gap, literally drilled holes.”

She also mentioned scramblers who use off-road motorbikes, even though they were not allowed to.

“Besides making it dangerous for those who are walking, I witnessed a group of scramblers, one of whom lost control and fell off his bike against the stop wall at Bingemma, which was recently restored.”

She said that it was useless to restore places if nothing was going to be done to protect the area after, especially when usually the solutions are simple.

“The government does not vandalise, but if the government receives a vandalism report and it does not take action, I would say that it is an accomplice to the crime because it is doing nothing to deter future vandalism.”