Watchdogs say no to ‘train wagon boathouse’ in St Thomas Bay

A bid to turn a British cargo carriage into a fixed beach room in St Thomas Bay, is facing opposition by the Environment Resources Authority and the Superintendence for Cultural Heritage.

The train wagon predates the 1968 survey sheets, but the environmental and heritage watchdogs are warning that turning a temporary structure into a permanent building will only formalise the beach room area further.

The corroded metal structure forms part of a row of beach rooms located on Ix-Xatt il-Batterija ta’ Rihana, in St Thomas Bay.

A request to permit its reconstruction triggered an investigation into whether the wood-and-steel structure had originally formed part of the Maltese rail infrastructure, and therefore an item of heritage value.

The deteriorated carriage was found to be a British import mounted on a vehicle during colonial times, that were also used as storage sheds. The SCH concluded it was not worthy of preservation.

But the Planning Authority has also received another request to regularise another “boathouse” 90 metres away from the wagon, this time consisting of a fixed stone structure with external steel spiral staircase, a parapet wall and a steel awning structure at roof level.

The ERA is digging its heels to oppose regularisation, saying illegal development in the area has “resulted in considerable deterioration of the site’s coastal environment and its surroundings” and that approval would only lead to increased pressure for similar developments.

The PA’s rural policy guidelines cannot be invoked to allow pre-1978 structures to be regularised, according to a decision by the PA’s planning commission, if applicants cannot prove legal, residential use of the boathouses – illegal structures built in a kind of coastal shantytown.

In 2006, local plans proposed an action plan to regularise these beach rooms but nothing ever saw the light of day, with the PA continuing to refuse applications to regularise boathouses.