Local plan for south Malta excludes school development

The local plan regulating all development in the south of Malta does not allow the government to develop a public school in the Zonqor area.

Various government spokespersons, including the Prime Minister, have compared the development of a private university campus at Zonqor to the construction of new public schools in outside-development zones.

But it turns out that although the local plan for the south allows new schools that replace old ones to be located outside the development limits, such schools can only be constructed along the parameter of the ODZ boundary.

One of these conditions is that development of the site must not result in the “coalescence of urban settlements”, when the proposed American University at Zonqor will effectively result in building a stretch of land between two built-up areas, effectively breaching this policy.

The site must also be easily accessed from an arterial road and entrance to and exit out of the site must not cause a traffic flow hazard. Zonqor Point is not presently easily accessible from any arterial road.

And the siting must have “no significant adverse impact on adjacent protected areas, groundwater vulnerability, or nearby settlements.”

But Zonqor is located in an area designated for a natural park by the same local plan. Effectively, the government is now reducing the size of the natural park by taking away the area earmarked for the campus development.

Since 2000, two ODZ schools were constructed: a 22,830 sq. m. facility at Ta’ Zokrija (Mosta), and another school with a site area of 15,940 sq. m. at Ta’ Karwija (Kirkop). Unlike the Zonqor campus site, both sites abutted on the development zone boundary.