Sliema garden loses protection status for boutique hotel development

A Sliema property had its scheduling on its garden removed by the Planning Authority a mere four months after being awarded Grade 2 protection by the Planning Authority.

The 19th century townhouse at the intersection of St Vincent and Carmel streets, named Trafalgar House, is earmarked for the development of a boutique hotel in a planning application still being assessed by the PA.

The original two-storey townhouse is to be restored and have another three floors added to it. The application presented by Muriel Thake also foresees the development of four levels of apartments in the back garden of the townhouse, which has now been de-scheduled.

Grade 2 properties are largely protected from demolition but may be subject to internal alterations.

In the case of the Cloisters palazzo in St Julian’s, which enjoys the same Grade 2 level of protection, the PA also approved an extra storey on top of the house apart from a seven-storey block in its unscheduled garden at the back.

The Superintendence for Cultural Heritage has already noted the “rarity” of the garden in the urban Sliema context, noting that allowing the development would mean “the garden will be lost.”

The NGO Flimkien Ghall-Ambjent Ahjar has appealed the PA’s decision to de-schedule the gardens of the villa, by challenging the scheduling process which includes no public consultation before decisions with a direct bearing on historic landmarks are taken.

Trafalgar House and the garden as seen from Google Maps, which has now had its scheduling withdrawn

The organisation also invoked the Aarhus Convention which obliges public authorities to provide information on decisions impacting on the environment. “In this case the PA did not observe the convention as it decided to de-schedule the garden without informing anyone,” lawyer Claire Bonello on behalf of Flimkien Ghall-Ambjent Ahjar, said.

If upheld, the appeal would have a revolutionary impact on the opaque manner in which decisions are presently taken over de-scheduling of protected buildings.

The PA denied MaltaToday a list of buildings awaiting scheduling in 2017, arguing that this would result in “external interference that may hamper the scheduling process.” Sources in the PA pointed out that publishing such a list could effectively endanger some of these buildings. But such reasons do not apply to cases of buildings whose protection is removed.

Recently the PA accepted a request for scheduling made by the daughter of the late premier Dom Mintoff, for his Tarxien villa to get Grade 1 protection. In Sliema, a request by the Sliema local council to schedule the Fort Cambridge officer’s mess at Tigné, is still awaiting a decision from the PA – a decision that would have a direct bearing on the fate of a planning application by construction giants Gap Holdings for a 40-storey tower.