Birzebbugia hotel to climb to nine storeys

A Birzebbugia hotel could climb to nine storeys, just nine months after obtaining a permit for a seven-storey hotel overlooking Pretty Bay.

The existing four-storey Sea Breeze guesthouse owned by Charles Azzopardi has applied for the addition of two storeys to its seven-storey permit.

The Superintendence for Cultural Heritage had originally expressed its concern on the increase in the hotel’s height, due to its prominent location immediately next to the locality’s urban conservation are. It said that the hotel would visually dominate and condition the surrounding streetscape around Pretty Bay.

Even the Planning Authority’s case officer recommended a refusal due to the creation of an unsightly blank party wall.

Although the maximum height in the area is limited to five floors (17.5m), an additional two floors were approved under a policy allowing hotels an extra two storeys over and above height limits. As approved in 2020, the new hotel will see an increase from the current 32 rooms to 86.

Following changes to the façade in new plans endorsed by the PA’s internal design panel, the seven-storey hotel was approved by the PA’s planning commission.

A photomontage of the development shows the hotel dominating the bay along with the eight-storey high Water’s Edge hotel owned by Charles Polidano which was approved in 2007. In 2017 the PA refused an application by Polidano for an additional storey on his hotel.