Car importers Easysell want ODZ petrol station in St Paul’s Bay

Vehicles importer Easysell has applied to construct a petrol station outside development zones, in an area known as Tal-Qarbuni in Burmarrad.

The development, set to include a service station, a car wash, an office and a retail shop is being proposed along Triq Burmarrad in St Paul’s Bay, and comes in the wake of a new policy regulating the development of petrol stations.

While only existing petrol stations can be relocated to ODZ areas, brand new petrol stations can be located “opposite or adjacent” to “areas of containment” outside development zones.

The new policy does not impose any limit on the size of petrol stations in such areas.

The proposed development is located within such an area. 

These so-called areas of containment are ODZ areas where low-level industrial activity or storage is allowed.

Areas of containment are meant to create a transition between industrial or tourism areas, and rural areas: in Malta there are 33 such ODZ sites designated as areas of containment. They include parts of Bahar ic-Caghaq, Burmarrad, the Hal Mann site in Lija, various parts of Mdina Road, St Leonard Street in Zabbar, Tal-Balal in San Gwann and part of Hal-Farrug road.

Over the years MEPA refused three applications to construct a boundary wall around the Tal-Qarbuni site, as this was not deemed to be essential for agricultural purposes.  

An application presented by Easysell’s Anthony Fenech to enclose the car wash area with a wall was also refused in 1995. The decision was confirmed by the appeals board in 2000. The proposed development consisted in the placing on the site of a ‘car wash machine’ and a ‘mobile office’ on the abandoned field. 

In its decision, the Appeals Board had noted that the site had been excavated without the necessary permission, and that the excavated material was left lying on the site, which consequently started being used for illegal dumping. 

“The appellant should in fact be made to remedy the situation by rehabilitating the site, reinstating soil cover and a rubble boundary wall of a suitable height, thereby restoring the rural character of the site,” the board said.

Similar applications were refused in 1999 and 2002.

The site of the proposed petrol station is now part of a rural conservation area but is also adjacent to a storage area.

So whe whole site, including the part earmarked for the petrol station, was designated as an “area of containment” in the 2006 local plan. And an enforcement against the illegal construction of a wall has been pending since 1997.