Issue link: https://maltatoday.uberflip.com/i/673696
maltatoday, SUNDAY, 1 MAY 2016 12 News JAMES DEBONO AN application has been pre- sented to regularise a compound which includes warehouses, ga- rages, a villa, an open storage area, and an internal road devel- oped without a permit over the past decades on a site along Triq l-Ibrag in an area known as Tat- Tutta in San Gwann, a short dis- tance from St Michael's School. The application was presented by Matthew Bonello, owner of Central Garage Limited. The entire site, replete with il- legal structures, covers an area of approximately 12,063 square me- tres. The illegal warehouses and garages complex set over three levels occupy a floor area of ap- proximately 3,669 square metres and are used as storage for light industry, vehicle storage and ve- hicle maintenance. The residential property con- sists of a 342square metres villa which is also earmarked for con- tinued use as a residence. The site also includes a two-sto- rey building which is still under construction, identified for use as administration offices for the complex and an open storage area over 2,097square metres of land. The aim of the application is to regularise the existing structures and activities on site with the exception of the chicken coop, which will be demolished. The primary objective of the application: "is to better organise the site, and to upgrade the facil- ity in order to comply with cur- rent environmental standards, in particular for waste management and surface water management". A planning saga The planning history pertaining to the Scheme Site dates back to the late 1980s, when permission was refused for development in the areas in 1988 and 1989. Subsequent applications for the development of garages and of- fices presented in 1991 were also refused in 1996 and 2000, respec- tively. Enforcement action was taken a number of times during this period. Enforcement orders were is- sued in 1994 against the con- struction of "offices and other structures without permit" and against a "villa and garages with- out permit"; and again in 1998 against "construction of villa without permit". In 2004, the applicant submitted an application "to sanction ga- rages, bungalow and yard". This application was refused by MEPA in June 2006, and again after re- consideration in March 2007. The applicant subsequently ap- pealed the decision. But once again in January 2014 the Envi- ronment and Planning Review Tribunal (EPRT) dismissed the appeal and upheld MEPA's deci- sion to refuse permission. In 2009, an application was submitted "to sanction a yard for building material." This applica- tion was also refused by MEPA, in February 2010, and again after re- consideration, in April 2011, and by the Appeals Tribunal in Janu- Illegal beachclub in Portomaso to be regularised JAMES DEBONO A 17-year saga on the regularisa- tion of various illegalities on a 3,670 square metre beach club within the Portomaso enclave, is nearing its end after a case officer report has recommended the regularisation of this development. The illegalities included extensive paving of parts of the shoreline. The application presented in 1999, when an enforcement order against the illegalities was issued, seeks to regularise the existing beach club and the stores constructed below it and seven boathouses at the en- trance of the marina. It also envisions an extension of the beach club and the reconstruc- tion of an existing lighthouse which will now be reconstructed at a high- er level of 1.2 metres. The owners' failure to remove these illegalities was one of the rea- sons why the Planning Authority board chaired by Austin Walker had turned down the development of 46 villas on a nearby site previ- ously designated as an ecological zone. But the permit was still issued by an appeals tribunal after the change in government. A report by an environmental consultant hired by the developers to assess the environmental impact of these illegalities states that the "extent of built development is sig- nificantly more extensive than en- visaged in the permit. "The whole of the site has been built up and hard surfaced whereas the original permit envisaged a rel- atively extensive area of soft land- scaping," which also separated the pill box from the clubhouse. It also notes that the beach club as constructed immediately abuts on the World War II pillbox. But the report states that prob- ably the development did involve take up of the rocky foreshore and mostly affected an area subjected to dumping in the 1950s which was later colonised by vegetation. The area on which part of the develop- ment is set to take place is a level 3 area of ecological importance. MEPA's Environment Planning Directorate had expressed its con- cern on "the encroachment on the coast" and the "obliteration of the buffer zone" between the pillbox and the clubhouse. But the Planning Directorate con- cluded that the boathouses do not have any visual impact, as they do not exceed the height of the sea wall. As regards the beach club it noted that the area was over excavated to make room for the stores. But since these were located beneath the beach club they have no impact. Illegal San Gwann compound proposed for regularisation