A 1955 British Pathé documentary opens with sorrowful footage of Malta’s urban fabric in the aftermath of World War II and then proceeds with a speech by Dom Mintoff who was not only much concerned with rebuilding the heavily hit areas but also building from scratch a welfare State after materialising his ill-fated integration plan with the UK.

I thought the title of that documentary is a fitting title for this article and, in more ways than one, a metaphor for the way I see the local construction industry.

Despite being away from Malta for almost a decade, I am very much ‘synched’ with ongoing activity in the field to which I belong. While I strongly believe that the upward way is the forward way when it comes to building design, this should not be an ad hoc process in the same way that one would submit an application to build, say, a three or even five-floor block.

Many years after the bold and (in the local context) avant-garde precedent set by the Portomaso Tower, we are finally seriously contemplating once again the possibility of building ‘towers’.

There were a few exceptions along the way but in the space of a few weeks I have seen the papers flooded with images of proposals and all within the radius of 1.5 kilometres or so, epicentred around Paceville/St. Julian’s.

The images taken off the newspaper pages I read online present some major faults: the renderings typically show only the project in concern – with their very immediate surroundings – but fail to show each other (except in a schematic diagram prepared by the Times of Malta), when, in most of these renderings, they will virtually all be overlapping in the respective views.

Careful urban planning has been very much non-existent bar some exceptions

This tunnel-vision way of seeing these projects is a serious miscalculation of the overall, macro-scale visual appearance of these towers, where the whole is not necessarily the sum of the individual parts.

One cannot view any of these projects in isolation but the relationships that these buildings have with each other and the relationship they share with the existing skyline (including existing relatively tall buildings) should be seriously considered.

Perhaps there is an urgent need to establish a view management framework, akin to what the City of London has, which will stipulate how tall buildings should fit in within an existing urban landscape without adversely affecting ‘view corridors’ of strategic landmarks. For instance, London has St Paul’s Cathedral; Malta has Valletta as its prime candidate and, indeed, Valletta is by far the prime potential victim in this case, especially in the light that there have been real threats in the recent past of our capital city being struck off the Unesco World Heritage list as a result of hostile visual impacts of the Tignè Point development. Perhaps that was only a case of first time lucky?

This brings about the question: what happens if even more towers are built in the future? Hence, even simultaneously considering the towers planned at any point in time does not suffice; a holistic long-term masterplan is required which sets and defines parameters on amacro level which then ensure that if a (potential) tower is proposed and built in the future, the visual implications are not adverse.

This does not entail designing whether a tower will be circular or square or rectangular in form or whether it is clad in glass or used for office or touristic accommodation or residential purposes but simply establishing the rules which then define the urban massing.

The issues mentioned, however, are not to be overlooked. One cannot set parameters for towers that might work from an urbanistic and volumetric relationship but then remain vacant or, if occupied, place burdens on existing infrastructure such that it does not work. Accessibility is the obvious one but there are other (thankfully) hidden aspects, primarily sewage. All of these aspects require careful and detailed study by qualified (and independent) planners.

Being a structural engineer, I cannot not mention also more technical aspects.

As expected, tall buildings are prone to wind loading significantly much more than buildings of a ‘traditional’ height where one could perhaps get away with any explicit consideration by mere rules of thumb (although not a very technically sound approach, but that is another story).

More importantly, the effects of tall buildings on neighbouring tall buildings are not to be underestimated (for instance, funnelling and vortex shedding effects created by tall buildings in close proximity) and one cannot design a tall building today and then have another tall (or taller) building built in a few years’ time, which might jeopardise the structural behaviour of the existing, not to mention pedestrian comfort levels at street level.

The complexities of the effects of wind on buildings beyond a certain height can only be captured by careful study by specialists using certain techniques.

In addition, due consideration to the effects of seismicity cannot be underestimated. For the height and scale of the buildings being proposed, it is extremely likely that these will be exposed to the highest levels of acceleration in any potential earthquake striking the Maltese islands and, combined with the heavy mass of a large tall building, the towers will then be subjected to large seismic forces.

In addition to these, one cannot underestimate the significance of foundations for such heavy buildings, especially in the context of a poorly-studied geology as repeatedly stressed by geologist Peter Gatt. For instance, it is well-known that the area in question is relatively geologically poor, heavily fissured and cavernous.

The problem of Malta and its construction industry and, in particular, in the last few decades (as opposed to, for instance, during the times of the Knights when massive projects, like the building of Valletta, were strictly adhering to rules set by the then governing authorities), is that much is done ad hoc or, at best, to suit the developer and/or to achieve political brownie points. Careful urban planning has been very much non-existent except for some exceptions, which are now in an absolute minority.

I am all in favour of high-rise developments (especially if, like Renzo Piano’s jewel, they serve to increase the momentum to spearhead Maltese architecture into the 21st century; the proposals from the Zaha Hadid studio promise to be such examples), provided that they serve their true purpose, that is, allowed to build higher as a way of compensation for leaving more open and green space – the fundamental concept behind the floor-area-ratio.

Now that we are at the very tip of the springboard, the professionals, the planning and third party bodies urgently need to combine their efforts to set ground rules and ensure the game is fair play for all before it kicks off.

Otherwise, the harshest foul will be endured by Malta and the situation will be very much the opposite of the situation depicted in the 1955 video, for, ironically, it will be construction that will bring about the destruction of the little island we call home.

Karl Micallef is an architect and civil/structural engineer.