A €5.5 million three-year project that will see the Ta' Qali national park extended by the equivalent of four football pitches is to be carried out starting from October.
The site was this morning visited by Resources Minister George Pullicino, who said that five extensions were carried out on the site in the past seven years.
Architect Mario Bonello explained that the park is currently divided into three parts – the formal zone, the informal zone, which includes the picnic area, and the adventure park. Each zone is closed off by fencing.
The project's aim is to integrate all zones through the removal of fencing, roads, and two parking areas.
Preliminary work will see the upgrading of a parking site to the north of the park to take an additional 100 cars, bringing the total to 1,030. This will be over and above the parking spaces in front of the US embassy.
A new parking area will also be formed in front of the Farmers' Market.
The ring road will be upgraded to include a 3.5 kilometre cycling and jogging track.
Mr Bonello said that the extended park will have two entrances. The car access from the Crafts' Village side will be upgraded and a new road to the park will be created. The aim is to completely remove traffic from the central area.
The main entrance will be pedestrianised and a new fountain will be built.
The parking area in front of adventure park will be transformed into a skate park which could be turned into an arena when necessary. There will also be seating stands. A water park with changing facilities will be also be created.
The large parking will be transformed into a toddlers' area which will include a cycling track for children and a jogging track for parents.
A butterfly house is to installed in the formal area and an application has already been submitted to create a petting farm in the crafts' village site.
The butterfly and petting area are excluded from the 19,500 metre square extension.
Mr Pullicino said the project will include the planting of 1,000 trees to be added to the existing 21,000.
Although the €5.5 million excluded the upgrading of existing streets, the sum included the expenses on new ones, he said.