Bahar ic-Caghaq residents object to scouts' proposal for a camp site

Residents of Xatt il-Palm in Bahar ic-Caghaq have expressed concern over the proposed development of a camp site at a former military camp site outside the development zone.

The Planning Authority last April approved an application by the Birkirkara Scouts Group for the "rehabilitation of a camp site including landscaping works".

Residents are saying that this development will result in the closure of the footpath joining Xatt il-Palm with the main road, denying reasonable pedestrian access to and from the bus shelter.

However, group scout leader Anthony Vella said the footpath was created by residents a few years ago and fell within the perimeter of a site he had been using since 1985.

He said the group had now obtained the site from the government for a 50-year term.

The residents said the site had been used as a camping area by various scout groups who also used a room within the site, with the permission of the Police Commissioner.

"We feel it is grossly unjust that such an extensive development should be allowed so near, not to say within, a residential area, with only a few metres separating it by a narrow road from existing residences," the residents said.

"Up to the present day, we have had to put up with campfire smoke, unreasonable levels of noise and, most of all, the inability to park in front of our own doorstep, especially at weekends."

The residents said that a proposed fencing/closure at the top of Xatt il-Palm and the footpath joining Xatt il-Palm with the main road denied reasonable pedestrian access to and from the bus shelter.

A spokesman for the residents said that the area, which was used as a camp site by British Forces, had never been closed off and he maintains that the footpath had always been there.

He said the footpath also provided a short cut to the church and a play area for children of the locality.

Residents, the spokesman said, were not against the presence of scouts as such but they objected to the fact that they would not be able to enjoy an area because it was occupied by non-residents.

He said a scout group was cutting down trees to build a fence and there was concern after a 40-foot container was deposited adjacent to the site a few days ago.

However, Mr Vella said the site was a dump when the scouts first started using it and it had taken them some three weeks to clear it up. The whole area was now being rehabilitated.

The footpath in question, he said, had only been opened up by residents and was actually in the midst of the site and no footpath at all.

"What the residents want is something they never had."

Mr Vella said that camping scouts sometimes had their stuff stolen from the site so now they were putting up poles and closing the area to keep it secure. In time, he said, it was to be fenced.

The site, he said, was currently being used by the Mosta Scouts for 10 days.