I fell in love with this place. There was always something going on that was quite appealing - be it kids playing around the fountain, students meeting up for a chat and a drink, or locals out to enjoy the evening air. There are a few cafes and bars down one side of it (beside the Balluta Building) and a kiosk at the opposite side. In the middle is a fountain and at one end a kind of covered shelter (a shelter against the sun, I should add). It's all very picturesque and a bit of an oasis away from the very busy promenade across the road."

I stumbled on this miniature travelogue on the internet. If you google Balluta Bay, there are many more where that came from. Balluta Square (Wikipedia is more accurate and refers to it as a triangular pjazza) works. It works in the way the newly refurbished, very smart, quasi-clinical Spinola garden never will. And you know what they say about things that work - if it ain't broke, don't fix it.

But that's Malta and the Maltese for you. Hell-bent on embellishment (the very word is frightening and strangely onomatopoeic) and improvement. The reason Balluta Square is so popular is precisely because it's personable and not the new and improved vernacular version that it will undoubtedly become, if left in the unanimously approved hands of the PL and PN council members whose intention, in the words of the mayor Peter Bonello, is to improve the village and in no way cause damage to anything within St Julian's and particularly to its patrimony.

There is no doubt in my mind that the council members are full of good intentions. As undoubtedly well-intentioned as all the other so-called improvements which have seen a not-so-slow but very sure degeneration of our island, which in another life was an absolute gem. No government wakes up one morning and deliberately sets out to ruin a country, but it happens a lot. More so here in Malta, where we seem to be cursed with the reverse Midas touch.

So yes, I am very doubtful and mistrusting of these intentions and improvements, as we all are, because we are hardly surrounded by landscape architects, the likes of Lancelot 'Capability' Brown. We are fed up with being humoured, of having to listen to the sort of circular argumentation or sophistry which the mayor of St Julian's obviously majored in.

His main argument is that no damage will occur as any improvement will only take place if and when all permits are successfully issued and that clearly means that no damage will be caused as no entity in its right mind would issue such permit otherwise.

If entities had minds, Mepa would be certifiable. Of the schizophrenic, lock-up and throw away the key variety. The only thing clear to me is that here in Malta the issuing of permits has never been rooted in any rhyme or reason and most certainly has never depended on aesthetic considerations. You need look no further than the mismatch that is Tower Road, or get onto a speed boat and cruise the coast to see the aesthetic mess the island is in.

As for damage control - we're 'build now, worry later' kind of people - the sort who permit development in valley beds and watercourses. Think about it the next time you're wading through Valley Road in your car, after a mini-downpour.

What the mayor conveniently chose to omit from his letter published earlier this week, was a conversation he had with a few people on a recent visit to Balluta Square, where he very matter-of-factly announced that a car park was going to be built underneath the square, and the square itself extended to the shop pavements, eliminating the little side road that runs alongside.

When asked how this could be done without endangering the underlying tree roots, he immediately justified the chop by flippantly declaring that all the trees in the square had been expertly examined and were found to be sick.

While he may have been paving the way for a new improved square, complete with underground car park that would suit nobody, he probably never imagined that everyone else would immediately understand the implications of his deforestation plan perfectly.

So another tree expert was called on site, and sure enough, as even I could have told you, the Balluta oak trees are thriving. When confronted with this fly in the ointment, the mayor did what most people who discover they've just been caught with their hand in the cookie jar, do. He was evasive and mumbled something about "just the one tree".

The mayor has assured us that Balluta Square is not part of the project and anyone saying otherwise is simply not informed or is intentionally misleading others.

If we are not informed, then it's high time we were. Because everyone who has thus far attempted to glean some information from the local council has been received with that very pass-the-buck, not- so-civil, service.

You see, when people have a sinking feeling about something, they're usually right. With repeated talk of 'improvements' that are accounted for in a PN electoral manifesto, and headings like 'Traffic Management', a mayor who talks about underground car parks and sick trees, there's very little that needs to be left to the imagination.

Let's call a dog a dog - any improvements that come under a similar heading are destined for ugliness. To uproot and massacre one of the few remaining oases in Sliema to accommodate a mere 120-vehicle car park, which is so better suited to the Tiguglio area, is madness.

And if the mayor really wants to solve the parking problem and score points before he exits office he ought to introduce electric cabs in Sliema. That way, locals who are unwilling to walk from their home in Sliema to St Julian's for a bite to eat can take a cab. Just think of all the cars that will stay garaged at home and all the revenue it would translate into in the process!

michelaspiteri@gmail.com