I regret that Noel Galea Bason (Floriana Residents’ Traffic Nightmare Continues, March 12) failed to acknowledge the local council’s efforts, of which I am sure he is aware, to force events organisers to start clearing away the inevitable rubbish generated by thousands of visitors, during public events held in Floriana immediately the particular event is over, something unheard of until some years ago.
It seems that we have already forgotten the days when after certain events, including political mass meetings, the clearing up of tons of rubbish was left for the next day and was carried out at a leisurely pace with the result that this rubbish often spilled over into the rest of the streets of our town.
As regards the inevitable racket accompanying such events, the council has also sought to control the frequency of soundchecks, etc., and has intervened directly more than once to force the organisers to reduce the sound level. Therefore the council has been very proactive in curtailing and managing any inconveniences generated by public events and will continue to do so in the future.
With regards to the traffic issue, I was very sad that Mr Galea Bason deemed it fit to describe the local council’s contribution in this regard as “disgraceful” when it was the same council which introduced a sticker for Floriana residents with the aim, among others, of facilitating the access of the residents into Floriana during public events and it was also the same council which, at times, convinced the police to create alternative routes to access the residential part of Floriana or to limit the closure of certain points of access.
Notwithstanding this, there were times where some policemen manning the points of access seemed to be unaware of the agreement reached by the relevant authorities as regards the right of access of Floriana residents or were downright impractical and this has caused an amount of resentment.
However, I always believe that there is room for improvement in any matter and in future the council will insist on a wider choice of access, more signage indicating the various points of access to minimise congestion and prior announcement of the traffic management plan agreed upon so that drivers can work out beforehand their most convenient point of access.
On the other hand, I’m also sure that Mr Galea Bason is aware that Transport Malta and the police, by law, can overrule the council on any traffic arrangement and it is totally unfair to lump the council into the same boat with the other two entities since they don’t all carry the same weight when decisions are taken.
Even with all the goodwill in the world, public events will always create an amount of inconvenience and the only way of eliminating them altogether is to ban them totally from Floriana, albeit to the detriment of the commercial sector of our community.
I’m curious to know if Mr Galea Bason agrees to a ban on public events in Floriana or not.