Birkirkara: supermarket to create over 1,200 new car trips

A proposed supermarket and office and residential complex on a 4,000sq.m plot on Dun Karm Psaila bypass will create an average of 1,475 additional daily car trips over and above present levels, 1,214 solely by the new supermarket.

The development next to the Scan outlet, is proposed by Clement Gauci.

It will comprise a multi-level basement car park, supermarket at ground floor, offices on the first two floors, and 26 residential apartments over six levels. Just 130sq.m will be a designated “public piazza”.

It will rise three floors over the bypass, and six storeys on the narrow Triq Jannara and Triq Hal Gharghur.

The site has already been cleared of soil due to an archeological investigation by the Superintendence for Cultural Heritage, which revealed an underground shelter that the SCH wants incorporated in the development.

Although fronting a busy arterial road of retail developments and showrooms, the site protrudes into a densely populated area where residents are demanding more consultation and expressing their concern over parking spaces.

The developers’ Transport Impact Assessment contends that current junctions can absorb the traffic generated by the project, described as “medium scale” when compared to the existing traffic in the area. “Heavy traffic will be more prominent during the construction of the development rather than its operation,” the TIA said, with studies on air quality still being conducted.

The developers do not intend selling the residences, but rent them out to employees of the proposes offices, to reduce the traffic impact generated from the building.

The developers’ project statement justified the supermarket as a way of providing the community with “an easily accessible option without the need to travel to the city centre”, and to cater for other residents who “may currently have to commute a greater distance to the nearest retail market”.

The site is currently abandoned and undeveloped but was previously used for agriculture and as a boat yard. It also includes protected rubble walls, which are in a degraded state.

The PDS acknowledges that the visual amenity of the site will be negatively impacts during both the construction and operational phases, specially since the proposed Scheme lies in the immediate vicinity of a residential area while recommending a design which blend in with the surroundings.