Over 500 objections have been filed against a mammoth development which is being proposed by a company which Gozitan developer Joseph Portelli has shares in on a vacant patch of land in Mqabba.
The planning application proposes the excavation of the plot for basement garages (42 garages), aside from the proposed construction of 43 residential units from ground floor upwards. The plans indicate that the proposed development would stand 5 storeys high (including the ground floor).
The applicant is listed as CF Developers Ltd. and Clifton Cassar. CF Developers Ltd. lists CF Estates Ltd as the sole shareholder. Portelli and Cassar are both shareholders of CF Estates.
The architect is Maria Schembri Grima, the former head of the Building and Construction Authority who had stepped down in February this year following outrage over footage showing a dangerous demolition at a project she was leading.
The site, on Triq George Martin, Mqabba, is according to photos submitted as part of the application, currently a field, but the public application form within the application lists the main existing use of the site as 'residential'. The total site area is listed as 1,008.90 sqm.
While the site is in the development zone, it wasn't always so.
A Planning Control (PC) application was filed in 2018 on an area which includes the site in question. The PC application, which was approved, had sought to establish the zoning, building height and road alignment of the rationalization site, which included an area bigger than the site of the present application. The 2018 proposal was to zone the area for residential land use (terraced development). The Planning Directorate had, in the 2018 application, said: "The site was included within the Limits to Development through the 2006 Rationalization Exercise."
Objections to the proposed project have since streamed into the Planning Authority’s servers, with over 500 being filed.
Many outlined that such a development was out of the context when compared to the rest of Mqabba and almost all decried the take-up of vacant green land, calling on the Planning Authority to “respect the country rather than ruin it.”
Others noted that the Local Plan for the area limits the height of a development to three floors plus a semi-basement, noting that five floors above the ground and another two underground is “completely incongruous” with the area and will set an ugly precedent.
It is also noted in some objections that the proposal runs counter to the SPED, “particularly Thematic Objective 6.1 which emphasises the need to control the design and location of development.”
The site is also in very close proximity to where fireworks are let off for Mqabba’s village feast, raising concerns that this is a fire and safety hazard for anyone who would live in such a building if it were to be built.
It was further noted that the area was not designed to handle the influx of people that a 43-apartment development would bring, and that a Traffic Impact Assessment should be carried out and that the development should not justify the building of a new road.
The application is still pending a recommendation from the Planning Authority’s case officer, with the target date for when it will be heard being set for November this year.