Minister told to reduce footprint of mega fuel stations

The minister for the environment is being asked to consider changing the specifications of new fuel stations being relocated outside development zones.

The issue was placed on the national agenda last week when a Planning Authority board meeting had to be suspended as demonstrators from Moviment Graffitti and Kamp Emergenza Ambjent staged a protest. The board was voting on whether to approve the relocation of an urban fuel service station, to an ODZ location in Luqa.

The rules approved in 2015 have caused consternation among residents and environmentalists who have witnessed a roaring trade in the sale of urban fuel pump licences, to be developed into mega fuel service stations on countryside motorways.

But a review of the rules requested by minister Jose Herrera is now recommending that the 3,000sq.m footprint of the ODZ fuel service stations is reduced, and even prohibit the development of brand new petrol stations opposite industrial areas.

The review was drawn up by the Environment and Resources Authority.

It is unclear whether the minister will consider a moratorium on the applications for fuel service station permits pending the review.

Additionally, he has to contend with the competing interests of the Planning Authority itself, which falls under the purview of the roads minister Ian Borg.

The new rules had allowed relocation of petrol stations situated in urban areas, deemed to be unsafe, to ODZ areas where these can occupy 3,000sq.m of land.

However, they also allow brand new petrol stations inside, adjacent or opposite to industrial areas, areas used for storage and so called areas of containment, which tend to be transitional areas between industrial zones and the countryside.

In a small island like Malta, the countryside bleeds into urban centres as the only obvious form of demarcation between one village and the other.

But mega fuel service stations are changing this, taking up enormous footprints in stretches of road that demarcate Maltese villages.

Until recently the PA was considering several applications for ODZ fuel service stations including one on Mdina Road in Attard (see page 8), Triq Burmarrad in St Paul’s Bay next to a newly-approved one, and Qormi Road in Luqa.

In the protest held at the PA meeting, demonstrators asked why such a small island as Malta would need so many fuel stations. There are currently 14 applications for “massive so-called petrol stations” which, if approved, would take up an area more than five times the size of the Floriana granaries.

“We believe that destroying all this natural and agricultural land for mega complexes that include petrol stations, in a country that is by far the most built-up country in the EU, is pure madness and should be halted immediately,” the two NGOs said in a statement.

They added that the claims that the 2015 Fuel Stations Policy was aimed at removing petrol stations from urban areas was just “a lame excuse to justify the onslaught on Malta’s environment and quality of life that is making a few fat cats richer”.

The NGOs also accused the majority of the board members of ignoring objections to the projects they were approving.

The ERA is opposing the Luqa application, saying it takes up 3,000sq.m of agricultural land and creates a precedent for other developments along Qormi road.

The application originally envisioned a brand new petrol station but at a later stage it was changed to include the relocation of the petrol station on Savoy Hill in Sliema.

The petrol station will include a service station, a small shop, a tyre service garage, VRT Garage, ATM, and car wash facilities.

Three fuel stations exist in the radius of 1.2km in the vicinity of the proposed fuel station. The policy regulating fuel pumps only bans new petrol stations within a distance of a 500m radius of existing ones.