Lay Lay complex in Marsaskala could rise to eight floors

An additional 59 apartments are being proposed at the Lay Lay complex in Marsaskala by increasing the building height from the current four floors to eight.

The stand-alone 2,600sq.m complex is composed of a series of blocks and is in a densely populated area of Marsaskala.

It is surrounded by Triq in-Nadur, Triq l-Orangjo,Triq l-Ghassies and Triq Vittorio Cassar.

The application has been presented by developer Michael Axisa, the owner of Lay-Lay Company Limited.

The local plan sets a height limitation of four floors plus semi basement in this area which translates into a building height of 22m according to Annex 2 of the Development Control Policy approved in 2015.

But the application of this building height is not automatic as the PA must take into consideration the predominant height of buildings in the area, according to the same policy.

The current building was originally approved in the 1980s as a summer residence complex.

A permit was issued in 1999, allowing for the conversion of the 84 semi-finished, two-bedroomed apartments into 40 three-bedroomed ones. A request to add an extra floor was turned down in 2002. An underground supermarket on the same site was also approved in September 2013. This permit was last renewed in 2019.

Marsaskala is one of the localities where developers are also allowed to apply the floor area ratio on any site surrounded by four streets. This mechanism obliges developers who go above the height limitation to create a public open space around their projects.

In most other localities in Malta this is only allowed on sites greater then 4,000sq.m.

But in this case no such obligation exists as the eight-storey development will still respect the height limitation foreseen in the local plan, as re-interpreted in the 2015 policy annex.