The Mġarr local council will set up 14 marble road plaques representing the Way of the Cross, following a decision by the planning tribunal.

The tribunal overturned a refusal of the planning commission and gave the go-ahead for the permit so long as the council made the plaques smaller and presented a detailed method statement with the designs. The council filed an appeal after a planning commission refused the Via Crucis monuments application in 2011.

It wanted to put up 14 marble slabs measuring almost two metres by one metre in a rubble wall, which is in an outside development zone. The site is in a new road off Fisher Street, between the protected Ta’ Ħaġrat Temples.

In its refusal, the commission had said the development would have an “adverse impact” on an important archaeological site and clashed with planning policies. The council had argued that the road leads to a cemetery and the “proposed religious meaning” was in line with the area – a “place of prayer and meditation”.

However, the Heritage Planning Unit had contested the development, saying the plaques would be visible from the temple. The council countered that they would be made of quarry-cut, brown marble to “blend in” with the wall.

It accused the heritage unit of “clutching at straws” because the road had been given Cabinet approval, which has the “right to overcome” its opinion.

The council also dismissed the argument that there was an illegality on site because trees, intended to block the view from the temple, had not been planted.

In its decision, the tribunal noted the council’s argument that the trees stipulated in a previous permit were going to be planted through this new application.

It also said the marble slabs would not be visible from the temples as they would protrude fewer than 50cm from the rubble wall, blend in with the surroundings and be hidden by the trees.