Frans H. Said, St Paul's Bay
A 'grand and glorious' gate for Valletta
During the election campaign it was stated that one of the priorities of the present government was to re-instate the Valletta bastions that had been tampered with during the last 50 years.
Now it is again being advocated to continue with their destruction so as to replace a gate with a gap at the main entrance of Valletta. If we really want to rehabilitate our magnificent and glorious city we must provide a "grand and glorious" gate such as the one that was dismantled or on the scale of Portes des Bombes or Victoria Gate. Calling it by any other name, an anomaly will always be an abnormality.
I do not dispute the capabilities of Renzo Piano, but his modern ideas do not fit in a Baroque city.
We cannot keep on making mistakes with the hope that our children will be able to correct what we do wrong.
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p.grima
Oct 30th 2008, 21:56
We frequently hear and read a lot about the demolished Royal Opera House, and rightly so.
It is ironic to me that the Valletta City Gate (even if it was Thompson's) was dismantled by our own hands after surviving even the second world war.
Could anyone kindly give me any information as to what happened to, and the present state, and whereabouts, of any of the former Valletta City Gates? Are there any plans in the pipeline to re-assemble or rebuild any of them in its former glory? Do plans of Laparelli's original, Dingli's, or Thompson's Gates still exist? These gates are historically true. I believe that if the Valletta City Gate were to be rebuilt, the Maltese people should be able to choose any one of these three (Laparelli, Dingli, or Thompson's) historically correct gates.
An ultra-modern gate, or the present "garage door" doesn't fit on to a 400+ year old Baroque Capital fortified city that is also a UNESCO World Heritage Site. Also, one has to bear in mind that the present "gate" is still less than 50 years "old" since it was erected in 1964. Please let's not wait long enough to let it become scheduled.