Qui-Si-Sana to get garden... and maybe a new car park

Qui-Si-Sana will soon have a lush garden and playground along its promenade, now that the planning authority has given the green light to the embellishment project.

But when its application was being discussed, fresh plans to build an adjacent car park were revealed, raising speculation that this could be a revival of an old proposal that had been heavily objected to by residents.

However, the Resources Ministry assured residents the car park was nothing like the one that had been discussed in 2006 and was simply aimed at replacing the spaces that would be lost with the garden's construction.

The two-storey underground car park, which still has to be approved by the Malta Environment and Planning Authority, will cater for around 90 cars.

On Thursday, the Mepa board unanimously approved the government's application for an elaborately landscaped garden along the Tigné promenade.

The area at present houses two small makeshift car parks with about 50 spaces and a dilapidated garden. But this will be replaced by a gazebo, hard and soft landscaping, a network of underground reservoirs and public facilities.

The garden is to be excavated below street level so the structures will not be imposing and will be protected from the wind.

Dating back to 1999, the car park proposition had been a stumbling block for the Nationalist Party (with a stronghold in Sliema), with Qui Si Sana residents protesting whenever it was mooted.

But the Qui-Si-Sana Residents Association yesterday told The Times it had met the minister to discuss the project and so far there were no objections.

Chairman Simon Camilleri said the original car park proposal was "a commercial project disguised by a car park".

"The minister promised us this new car park will not even have so much as a kiosk. But we are keeping a close eye because we do not want to see the project morph into something bigger as sometimes tends to happen. We have no objection if this is just an embellishment project where the car park will be run by the local council," he said, adding the association was promised everything would be ready by June.