Green light on Kantra beach bollards from MEPA appeals tribunal

Ta’ Cenc hotel owner Victor Borg has been given a permit by MEPA’s Appeals Tribunal to install bollards to prevent vehicular access to the Kantra beach.

Originally Borg had applied to place a timber gate, completely closing access to a path linking the Ta’ Cenc Hotel to the Kantra Beach, where the hotel’s lido is located. Borg had also erected two pillars without a permit on the same site.

In 2013 the Planning Directorate successfully invoked the Structure Plan’s policy, securing public access to the coastline, to block the application. The Structure Plan allows free and unhindered public access around the coastline adjacent to the sea and at the top of cliffs.

Borg argued that this policy did not apply to this development “since the land in question is in private ownership and there is no right of passage to the public over such land”.

The authority’s legal office disagreed with this view, insisting that this policy also applies to private land.

MEPA’s appeals tribunal has now partially reversed this decision by asking Borg to present new plans within the next 30 days for the installation of bollards to block access to vehicles.

A €100 fine was also imposed as a penalty for the erection of the two pillars which must be removed within six months.

The tribunal justified its decision saying that the Structure Plan policy is superseded by a local plan policy which defines this particular passage as a “pedestrian path”. Therefore, the tribunal claims that MEPA should simply protect access for pedestrians while allowing Borg to block access for vehicles.

By overturning the previous decision, the tribunal has ensured that Borg will not have to submit a completely new application, as is normal practice when a permit is refused and a new proposal is proposed.   

In his appeal the developer justified blocking access to the beach by referring to the use of the path by jeep safaris, go-carting and off-roading.

The picturesque Kantra is a small peninsula jutting out on one side of Mgarr ix-Xini, with Fessej Rock and the Comino Channel as a backdrop. The site is known to attract several scuba diving clubs.