Old people’s home and 203 apartments proposed in Qajjenza

A 23-metre-high old people’s home and two neighbouring residential blocks rising to 19.9m are being proposed on the privately owned part of Enemalta’s former gas plant site.

The two residential blocks, rising to seven floors, will house 203 apartments and maisonettes. The proposed old people’s home will include 240 beds and will also be built over seven floors, but will be slightly higher than the adjacent blocks.

The development is being proposed on the northern part of the site, which is privately owned and entirely located within the development zone.

The project, proposed by Paul Attard’s Plan Limited, forms part of a larger site that includes land still owned by Enemalta, on which the Planning Authority issued a zoning permit in February.

Parallel to the planning application for a residential home and 203 dwellings, Attard has also filed a zoning application to allow part of his site to be used as a residential home.

The zoning permit issued in February limited residential development on the privately owned part of the LPG site to a height of 19.9m, with the residential block facing Triq l-Għannejja stepped down to 17.5m.

The old people’s home, now proposed to be slightly higher than the adjacent residential blocks, will replace the block of flats that was initially intended to overlook Triq l-Għannejja, part of which was meant to be 2.4m lower than the adjacent blocks.

However, old people’s homes are allowed two extra floors above the official height limitation.

The zoning permit issued in February also envisaged the construction of three commercial blocks rising to 22m on the Enemalta-owned part of the site.

Around 83% of the site owned by Enemalta is earmarked as public open space. So far, Enemalta has not submitted a full planning application.