A map of the proposed development.

Gżira mayor Conrad Borg Manché hopes the marina privatisation will give the council the opportunity to make wide-ranging changes to the adjacent garden, including moving it closer to the quayside.

Transport Malta recently issued a request for proposals for the 25-year operation of the Gżira Garden marina and the Land Department is conceding 489 square metres of land in the garden for use as a marina office and quarters against an annual payment of €55,000.

The rest of the garden will remain under the jurisdiction of the local council and not form part of the concession as inadvertently indicated in a report that appeared. The operator would make the council an annual contribution of €35,000 for the maintenance of the garden, which would complement the €25,000 a year already spent by the council, Mr Borg Manché said.

He sees the marina project as the ideal time to make changes.

The garden needs constant maintenance and upkeep

His vision is to buffer the garden from the busy road by enclosing it behind a “living wall” and to move the parking from the marina to the road side of the garden, leaving only an access road for the marina owners, who would be able to drop off people and goods but not park there.

Mr Borg Manché’s idea is also to turn the garden into a park with turfed areas where families can spend time, rather than its present layout where only the paths are accessible, with the rest being soil.

The council hopes to complement its own funds with an input from the Planning Authority’s urban improvement fund and from Transport Malta.

“The garden needs constant maintenance and upkeep. Tree roots tend to remain on the surface because the land was re-claimed and there is not that much soil depth. This makes them very unstable and this is why so many get uprooted by bad weather,” Mr Borg Manché said.