Motorists were left fuming on Saturday morning when they discovered southbound lanes on the Coast Road were closed without prior warning.

The key road – which Transport Malta has previously dubbed as “Malta’s most beautiful” – links Swieqi and Pembroke to the northern town of St Paul’s Bay and is used by thousands of commuters every day.

Traffic in the area rapidly built up on Saturday morning as southbound motorists were forced to seek alternative routes to reach their destinations.

Images published by popular Facebook group Maltese Road Traffic Updates showed a sea of cars jammed in arterial roads as a result of the unannounced closure. 

Southbound lanes will be intermittently closed throughout the weekend due to Europe Triathlon Youth Championship events, Transport Malta announced on Saturday morning.

But the transport regulator drew users’ ire for its failure to announce the closure beforehand.

Transport Malta only issued its warning to commuters at 10.49am – more than four hours after southbound lanes were closed to traffic.

Lanes were reopened at 11.30am but will close once again between 2.30pm and 7pm. They will also be closed on Sunday between 6.30am and 1pm, Transport Malta said in its “important announcement”.  

Road users were left unimpressed.

“Closure of 5 hours and you post this 30 minutes before it reopens. You are all unfit for purpose,” one wrote in response to Transport Malta’s Facebook post.

“Clowns. You should have advised this well beforehand,” another said.

One user said his mother had nearly missed a chemotherapy session because of traffic caused by the unannounced closure. It had taken him one hour to get from Buġibba to the Salini roundabout and back, he noted. The two are roughly 2km apart.

As critical comments flooded in, Transport Malta restricted comments beneath the post. 

Questions have been sent to Transport Malta. 

The Coast Road chaos marked the culmination of a difficult Saturday morning for Transport Malta road officials: crashes close to Mater Dei Hospital, in Mosta, southbound Santa Venera tunnels and Sliema's Triq ix-Xatt all led to significant road congestion in those areas, too.