I read Giovanni Bonello’s article ‘Let’s hide the majestic bastions’ with interest. The fortifications built by the Order (and let it be said those built by the British) are indeed all that more dramatic to look at and easier to understand if they are left in their pristine splendour with not a blade of grass to be seen along the parapets, bastions and curtain walls.

Many find it charming and ‘suggestivo’ to see bushes and shrubs softening the hard lines of the fortifications and the propensity to plant trees along the ditches and on the glacis further obscures works designed by some of the finest engineers in Europe. Unfortunately shrubs damage the masonry.

Having said that, it must be remembered that trees were planted behind the parapets along the military road orpomerio around the defences when these were operational. The trees provided shade, beauty and charm and at times even fruit for the inhabitants; while during a siege the trees could be cut down and used for barricades, fixing breaches and so on.

In Valletta the need to leave sufficient space for housing precluded the provision of an adequate pomerio and therefore of trees along a largely very narrow road. But where trees were planted (at St Barbara’s Bastion, the Lower Barrakka and St Saviour’s bastion) the effect is not at all unpleasing. Only on the main front (namely the walls facing Floriana) was there sufficient space for trees and formal gardens and it was indeed a pity that an opportunity to demolish the Vernon Club building (now the Central Bank) on St James’ Bastion was lost shortly after independence.

The treatment of the ditches and glacis calls for a different approach. Glacis traditionally were grassed covered as were ditches and it would in my view be entirely appropriate to grass over the remaining glacis. As for the ditches, there is an opportunity to turn them into things of great beauty by creating parterre gardens using low shrubs.

This has been with great effect in the ditches of Angers in France though less trees should have been used there. The various cities of Malta and Gozo could compete for an annual parterre championship. People would come from far and wide to see them.