Issue link: https://maltatoday.uberflip.com/i/1339768
15 maltatoday | SUNDAY • 14 FEBRUARY 2021 NEWS Not enough parking for 4,000 planning permits issued since 2019 JAMES DEBONO THE Planning Authority issued nearly 4,000 permits which in- volved a monetary contribution to compensate for parking spaces not adequately provided for by the approved development. The total number of such per- mits declined slightly from 2,501 in 2018 to 2,380 in 2019; a sharp- er decrease was registered in 2020 when the number of these permits dropped to 1,549. The latest statistics provided to MaltaToday do not indicate how many individual parking spaces were lost in the past two years. But the fact that thousands such permits were issued suggests that thousands of car spaces have not been provided for. In 2018 more than 8,000 park- ing spaces were not catered for in the 2,501 permits issued against the payment of a contribution for lost parking spaces. Planners consider this mech- anism to be a double-edged sword: while not providing park- ing spaces exacerbates traffic and congestion in localities, provid- ing for all parking spaces also entails more excavation, and that means greater disturbance and possible danger for people living in their vicinity. The PA has received €31 mil- lion in contributions to its Ur- ban Improvement Fund and Commuters Parking Provision Scheme, which money gets spent in projects benefitting localities. Thanks to its income from this compensatory mechanism, the PA spent €7 million in urban im- provements contracted in 2019 and 2020. An analysis of figures by Mal- taToday shows that the largest amount of such permits (279), were issued in the northern lo- cality of St Paul's Bay where de- velopers paid €2.4 million in lieu of lost parking spaces between 2019 and 2020. Other localities where a sub- stantial amount of permits re- quiring compensation for lost parking spaces were Birkirkara (203), Sliema (178), Gzira (160) and Msida (150). This suggests that the problem of parking is most acute in the north harbour region and the north of the is- land. St Paul's Bay accounts for near- ly 7% of all permits requiring compensation for under-provi- sion of parking while the Sliema, St Julian's, Gzira, Msida, Swieqi and San Gwann conglomerate accounts for a fifth of all such permits issued in 2019 and 2020. In Gozo the largest amount of such permits were issued in Vic- toria (88) followed by Xaghra (73). CPPS and UIF funds The CPPS and UIF funds are financed directly by fees paid by developers, businesses and shop-owners to MEPA if they are unable to provide the required parking facilities for their pro- jects – for example, underground garages for a block of apartments. The fees apply to all develop- ments when a change of use of an existing building carries a higher parking requirement, for exam- ple change of use from a shop to a restaurant or bar. The fee is also charged when a developer builds additional floors on top of an ex- isting building. Fees are also paid by restaurants who take parking spaces when establishing an out- side catering area. In 2018 the PA introduced a three-tier rate system whereby a one-car space not provided for would cost the developer €2,500. From the third to the ninth car space not provided for on site, the developer has to make a contribution of €6,000 per car space. From the tenth car space upwards, a €10,000 contribution per car space is imposed. While 70% of the generated fees are directed towards the locali- ty-based Development Planning Fund, the remaining 30% are di- rected towards green transport proposals called the Island-wide Green Transport Fund (IGTF). 2019 € paid 2020 € paid Total € paid permits St Paul's Bay 173 1.5m 106 0.9m 279 2.4m Birkirkara 125 0.9m 78 0.5m 203 1.4m Sliema 118 1.2m 60 0.7m 178 1.9m Gzira 107 1.2m 53 0.4m 160 1.6m Msida 93 0.9m 57 0.8m 150 1.7m St Julian's 83 1.1m 59 0.7m 142 1.8m Qormi 91 0.6m 43 0.2m 134 0.8m Mosta 87 0.6m 47 0.3m 134 0.9m Marsaskala 67 0.6m 52 0.3m 119 0.9m San Gwann 68 0.7m 42 0.3m 110 1m Top 10 localities were most permits providing compensation for unaccounted for parking spaces were issued €31 million paid by developers to PA urban improvement fund causes the asking price to increase by 16.3%, while units with three or more bathrooms command a further 53.1%. Different property types generate different premi- ums over the base catego- ry. Penthouses were often advertised with a 20.7% premium over an apart- ment in Sliema, while no statistically significant differences were found in advertising prices for maisonettes. Single-room listings found on the market were around 47.6% low- er than a one-bedroom, one-bathroom apart- ment, and most other property types returned a premium of 47%. According to the data, newly observed adverts were on the increase over the past two years. In August 2019, the number of newly ob- served rental properties shot up to roughly 950 after sitting below 600 in the previous month, and until June 2020 over 800 new properties were be- ing reported each month, bar December 2019 which saw just under 700. As the author of the study points out, this could indicate a growing preference towards rent- ing out properties instead of selling them outright, and could further sig- nal an increase in vacant properties following the COVID-19 pandemic. Throughout most of 2019, positive price changes outweighed neg- ative ones. Here, positive changes refer to an in- crease in the rental price, and negative changes rep- resent discounts over pre- viously advertised prices. But this effect began to taper off in the last quar- ter of 2019, when negative price changes began to feature in the job market at higher proportions. This suggests that land- lords were already more willing to accept rela- tively lower rents prior to the economic down- turn brought on by the pandemic. Things came to a head in April last year, when negative price changes commanded around an 86.3% share of all price changes in rents. There's no doubt that the pandemic had its ef- fects on the rental mar- ket. New data published by the Housing Authority found that 4,278 rental contracts were terminat- ed during the COVID-19 partial lockdown, of which 45% of these con- tracts terminated without notice from the tenant. In 93% of these contracts, the tenant was of a for- eign nationality. Shaken but as of yet un- stirred by the pandemic, the pre-1995 rent laws could pose a difficult challenge for the housing sector. Several families and individuals protect- ed by these rent laws are now at risk of eviction as landlords have the oppor- tunity to challenge their tenancies, after a 2019 court ruling declared the pre-1995 rent laws un- constitutional. The issue is less the economic ef- fects that this will have on the rental market, but rather the social implica- tions brought on by mass evictions. Landlords were already more willing to accept relatively lower rents prior to the economic downturn brought on by the pandemic. Things came to a head in April last year, when negative price changes commanded around an 86.3% share of all price changes in rents