Issue link: https://maltatoday.uberflip.com/i/712521
maltatoday, SUNDAY, 7 AUGUST 2016 40 This Week To most everyone, gulls are big noisy white seaside birds. It's actually a good general description of the group, because they are relatively large – at least compared with garden birds – and their colour scheme is basically white with various shades of grey (brown in young birds) and often some black at the extremities; they're also vocal and their lifestyle generally involves the sea. About a dozen species of gulls have been recorded in Malta, ranging from year-round resident to extreme rarity. A scarce visitor, the slender-billed gull (M: gawwija munqarha rqiq) lies somewhere in the middle of the spectrum. It is medium-sized as gulls go, and its giveaway feature is the finely tapered face that ends in an elegant, dark-red beak. Unless seen well, the slender- billed gull can be hard to single out especially if flying with, say, a flock of wintering black-headed gulls. But that, after all, is part of what makes nature watching ever fresh and exciting. GREEN IDEA OF THE WEEK 421: BATCH ERRANDS: Feel like you spend your whole week trying to catch up with the errands? Take a few moments once a week to make a list of all the errands that need to get done, and see if you can batch them into one trip. Not only will you be saving fuel, but you might find yourself with much better time-management skills. Visit Friends of the Earth's website for more information about our work, as well as for information about how to join us. You can also support us by sending us a donation - www.foemalta.org/donate Text Victor Falzon Photo Aron Tanti 518. SLENDER-BILLED GULL Soy and biofuel production are destroying forests and people's livelihoods in South America and south East Asia. These industries are also contributing hugely to climate change. Friends of the Earth groups around the world are working with communities who are fighting the expansion of soy and biofuels. And we're pushing the European Union (EU) to drop their biofuel targets, which encourage forest destruction. We take hope from the fact that while the scale of the challenge is enormous, people already have solutions and alternatives that work at the scale we need. From decentralized community-owned renewable energy for mitigation, poverty reduction and sustainable development, to agro-ecological methods for adaptation, there already exists a wealth of proven ideas and experience from which to build a global transformation way. Friends of the Earth groups around Europe are taking action to change the current unjust and unsustainable economic system and stop the further decline of the world's climate and the possibility of catastrophic climate change. Things to know about Climate Change 11 – What we want (continued) Quo Vadis, Malta? WRITING this piece the morning after the Planning Author- ity gave the green light to two mon- ster developments – the Mriehel high- rise blocks and the Townsquare tower (both projects hav- ing Gasan's hand in them) – I cannot help but feel power- less and desperate. I will admit – I did not believe they would be approved. Mrie- hel was included as a high-rise designated area only after the public consultation had ended. Perhaps naively, I thought that an application on an illegally zoned area – that goes directly against national law and the Aarhus convention – would make its refusal the obvious de- cision. The Planning Authority thought otherwise. Meanwhile, the Townsquare development, set to tower over the congested Sliema peninsula, was justified by the Planning Authority on an outdated social impact assessment from 2007 that the author freely admitted to being insufficient nine years ago; a traffic impact assessment that leaves much to be desired; no consideration of the effect of this development on the infra- structure in the area despite evi- dence of sewage overflows; and absolutely no analy- sis of the impact of this development on the protected Vallet- ta skyline from the Grand Harbour and the three cities. So I don't think I was being in any way overly optimistic in assuming that the Planning Authority would see sense and act accordingly. I was wrong. With 20 or so other high-rise projects in the pipeline (which are almost guaranteed to pass, considering the day's events), the Malta we know will soon be no more. *** The betrayal of Malta by our country's elites continues. When I was a child, brave environmen- talists took drastic measures against Fenech's Portomaso de- velopment. This year, some of those same environmentalists are fighting, and losing, more battles against the same class of wealthy developers. It would look like there is no hope for this country. Thankfully, Malta's environ- mentalists are made of sterner stuff than I am, and they do not give up so easily. There are some defeats, but there are also victo- ries, and it would be a disservice to those who hold our country at heart to be defeatist. *** I would just like to make it very clear that any guarantees the government and developers give are not worth the paper they are printed on. The very concept of the FAR policy, the policy al- lowing high-rise developments, was to allow more open space around them. Where are we see- ing these open spaces? Portomaso actually takes up and closes off more land as it continues growing. Tigne's, and now Townsquare's, open spaces are mere accessories to their commercial areas. Fort Cam- bridge's open space is akin to a canyon – a crack between two towers. Metropolis' open space is planned, in contravention of the PA's own regulations, some 30 floors above ground level. Again, these open spaces are the very reason for this policy, but there is not yet a single case where this has been truly re- spected. *** The sale of citizenship and other legislative measures have fuelled a construction boom. There is now a perceived need for luxury apartments, for peo- ple who will not be living in them, creating ghost towns of empty homes held for tax and investment purposes. These ghost towns will need to be supported by an improved infrastructure, presumably paid for out of the public pocket. There is foreign investment, and then there is selling off chunks of our country with a subsidy attached. Let us not confuse the two. Selling off what makes Malta special for 30 pieces of silver is a betrayal of this and future gen- erations. Robert Louis Fenech The Malta we know will soon be no more