Minister's word 'not good enough'

The committee of the Qui-Si-Sana Residents Association said yesterday it did not feel the concerns of those living in this Sliema locality were reflected in the brief for the proposed development of a car park there.

"The brief is just an outline and leaves a wide margin of interpretation open to abuse. It was changed to suit the developer and (Environment Minister George) Pullicino is not ready to change one word of this brief to reassure the residents," they said.

Reacting to comments made by the minister some days ago, the residents said that street parking facilities were definitely going to improve in Qui-Si-Sana as all new developments catered for their own parking and more.

"Visitors will soon be able to make use of parking available in Town Square, Tigné, Ghar id-Dud and the Pjazzetta plus the existing, under-utilised High Street car park.

"This clearly proves that the Qui-Si-Sana project plus outlets is unnecessary and only favours the developer and his backers.

"The Malta Environment and Planning Authority case officer admitted that the brief had to be changed in 2002 to interest the developer," the committee said.

It said introducing a residents' parking zone, as had been proposed, would cause chaos in that part of Sliema just outside the zone as all visitors would try to park there causing congestion in the narrow side streets.

"Furthermore, catering and leisure facilities are also allowed. Sliema is saturated with outlets. Commercial facilities do not have a place in Qui-Si-Sana. Change of use is still easy for a determined developer given some government goodwill.

"Mr Pullicino's word is not good enough for us," the committee said.

Mr Pullicino has said the government would make sure the safeguards in the brief, over which residents had expressed concern, would all be implemented to the letter.

According to the minister, the two main safeguards against change of use are the lease agreement between the government and the developer, which will bind the developer on the uses of the site, and that any change of use will require a development permit.