Four-storey office block proposed on Birkirkara Bypass townhouse

A four-storey office block with three underlying parking levels is being proposed on the site of a townhouse and its garden fronting the Dun Karm Bypass.

The house abuts a narrow, rural alley, Sqaq it-Tiġieġ, and a row of two-storey buildings along Triq San Ġiljan.

Plans foresee the retention of the façade and the front garden overlooking Triq San Ġiljan, while a new modern structure will face the bypass and the arrow alley instead of existing garages. Two of the proposed floors will be receded. Existing trees will make way for a slipway road to facilitate access to the office block.

Part of the site forms part of a hamlet where development is restricted to the committed footprint of existing buildings, and where shops are only allowed for local usage. But most of the garden earmarked for development lies outside the boundaries of the outside-development-zones settlement.

Although sandwiched between Birkirkara and the San Gwann industrial area and Mater Dei hospital, the ODZ status of the area creates a buffer between the two densely urbanised localities.

In 2007, the Planning Authority approved an outline application for the demolition of the building, retaining the existing front for the construction of a building “not exceeding the height of existing front elevation”. This was done against the recommended refusal of the case officer. But a full planning application was never presented and the development was not carried out.

A similar application for a clinic and showroom and two-storey residence, was also withdrawn after a case officer’s refusal in 2018. The latest proposal does not include a showroom and residential apartments, but is one storey higher than the 2018 application.

The case officer objected to the scale of the proposed development, finding it to be “over-development”. While noting the retention of the original façade, the Superintendence for Cultural Heritage had also objected to demolition and “the obliteration” of the garden and the removal “of distinctive architectural elements”. The Environment and Resources Authority had also warned that the 2018 development would set an “undesirable precedent for similar future development which would lead to loss of such green spaces within ODZ”.