Issue link: https://maltatoday.uberflip.com/i/1418273
16 maltatoday | SUNDAY • 10 OCTOBER 2021 NEWS JAMES DEBONO A proposed 10-storey hotel in Milner Street in Sliema should be refused because it will create a "bad neighbour development" in a residential area where hotels are not allowed, a case officer concluded in a report. The report will the basis on which the Planning Authority will take a decision on 29 Octo- ber. As proposed the new 27-room hotel will add seven additional storeys and a receded top floor on the existing two storey town- house whose façade will be re- tained. Although the site is only a short distance away from the seafront and other similar hotels, the im- mediate locality is still residen- tial in nature and "a new hotel use will create bad neighbourli- ness in this residential area." Moreover, according to the case officer the proposed hotel is not eligible to benefit from a pol- icy allowing hotels to qualify for two more storeys over and above the height limitation in the local plan, as it will create an exposed blank party wall which will nega- tively impact on the site's broad- er context. The policy in question stipu- lates that "no blank walls are cre- ated" by hotels benefitting from extra floors. Over the past year the develop- ers changed their original plans, reducing the proposed develop- ment from 13 to 10 storeys and the number of proposed rooms from 56 to 27. Sliema's Milner Street is zoned in the local plan as a residential area where new hotels are not normally permitted. But over the past years the PA has approved a number of hotel developments in this area, in- cluding the recently approved redevelopment of the Astra Ho- tel which will rise to 15 stories at the corner between Milner Street and Tower Road. On that occasion, the case of- ficer noted the designation of Milner Street as a residential ar- ea, but justified the development on the basis of other hotel com- mitments, including the Europa Hotel and the Park Hotel, and the fact that Sliema itself is des- ignated as a tourism zone. If approved the hotel proposed by Bonnici Brothers would fur- ther extend the hotel area into the residential neighbourhood. PA set to say no to 'bad neighbour' 10-storey Milner Street hotel The proposed new 27-room hotel would add seven additional storeys and a receded top floor on the existing two storey townhouse