Last Friday I saw for myself works being carried out in Bugibba to create, by the end of next month, a new perched beach that should serve well local residents and visitors alike. This project is costing Government and the Malta Tourism Authority close to half a million liri, but this is money well spent since it aims at improving Product Malta.
It is calculated that around 350,000 tourists visit the St Paul's Bay, Qawra and Bugibba area every year. Most of these come in summer. They come here for leisure and have every right to find new amenities that should enhance their experience of our country by making their stay a pleasant and enjoyable one.
Not only has Bugibba been identified for this project but once we proceed to do more beaches in the coming year, our next target is Qawra. This entire zone in the north of Malta needs upgrading and having proper beaches is a major step to provide added value to hotels and other tourist establishments in the area.
The choice of Bugibba is meant to serve different but complementary purposes: it serves to provide more space for swimming. It also means that hotels in the area will, from next year, be able to indicate in their own marketing programmes that there is a sandy beach literally just across the road.
The project is being carried out in such a way as to minimise any effect on the environment. We are here talking of a tourism zone that has long been in need of such a high quality amenity that will be provided according to the best possible standards that visitors have come to expect.
The project is in line with Government's commitments with regard to tourism as spelt out in the Pre-Budget document published last year, where we had pointed out that to be competitive, today's tourism sector demands strong emphasis on the product side. It was observed: "Ultimately we can only be competitive by ensuring that our country is not suffering from destination fatigue and is vibrant and trendy as ever. This means developing new tourism amenities such as well managed beaches that are designed according to the Blue Flag beaches criteria. In this respect, the recent St George's Bay project must be considered as a model to be emulated in other areas."
Over the past years Government has carried out various product improvement projects. These included embellishment works on Sliema, St Julian's, Gzira, Birzebbuga, Marsaxlokk, Marsascala, St Thomas' Bay as well as Xghajra. Last year we decided to go into major beach upgrading projects and St George's Bay was the first of its kind.
That project worked very well and the sheer number of Maltese and foreigners who have since frequented and enjoyed this new beach is the best satisfaction one can have from carrying out a project that was needed, and doing it well.
Until the St George's Bay project was completed, we had gone through the usual pain of groaning apart from outright lies, such as that it was planned to offer the entire beach to a hotelier in the vicinity to develop for the exclusive use of his guests. This concession does not extend to more than a third of the bay, apart from the fact that this was deliberately created on the corner of the new project, was offered through a tender process and that led to a nearby hotel gaining the concession.
This, however, did not limit in the slightest way the 100,000 persons or so who last summer enjoyed - most of them for the first time ever - St George's Bay which has really been developed for the enjoyment of the general public, without any conditions or hindrance of any sort.
Following the success of that project, I deem it as a compliment that many have approached us to say they would like to see the same management principles applied in many other bays.
The new beach at Bugibba will also have its flanks offered as concessions that can be taken up through a tender process. That is done to provide for an element of co-financing that covers regular maintenance of the beach, which in turn means that a safety mechanism is being created to ensure that such new projects not only look up to scratch on their inauguration date but are also maintained in a sustainable manner thereafter.
Once again, we shall ensure that the public area remains just that - public: for the free enjoyment of one and all, not least our families that require an upgrading of existing facilities.
Both with regard to St George's Bay and the perched beach at Bugibba, we are following this principle despite the fact that we are really talking of new bathing areas that did not exist before. In the case of St George's Bay, over the years it had eroded to such an extent that there was hardly any space left to enjoy it. In the case of the perched beach at Bugibba, what had existed up to now was a stretch of pointed rock that was hardly usable and that was not exactly attracting any crowds. This scene will change as of the end of July, just as has happened last year in St George's Bay.
The Bugibba perched beach is breaking new ground and is the first of its kind - being artificially created over a rocky surface and even leaving the foreshore in its original state according to environmental considerations.
Technically, if a natural beach does not exist in a particular site, creating one by the mere dumping of sand is not feasible since that would have only led to the sand being carried away again by storms, never to return.
The Maltese coastline is replete with rocky platforms that extend horizontally inshore from the waterline but with deep water close to shore. Access to the water is normally over a ledge or by making use of a steel ladder. The rocky surface, in most cases, is pockmarked and uncomfortable to walk on, let alone to lie on for sunbathing.
That is why we have decided for the first time to introduce the concept of a perched beach - providing a beach amenity on what is currently a rocky shore, in a manner that has the least environmental impact possible, while facilitating access to the sea and making greater use of rocky areas for sunbathing/recreational purposes. The project is also totally reversible should that be deemed necessary eventually.
An artificial perched beach as is being created in Bugibba includes a ridge in patterned acrylic concrete built along the shoreline, but a few metres away from the water's edge. The area inshore of the concrete ridge is then covered in a layer of coarse sand to ensure that rainwater or any wave overtopping when the sea is rough drains away quickly, and that the material is not likely to be blown away by strong winds.
As I was walking along the acrylic concrete ridge on Friday morning, it was rather difficult to distinguish between it and the natural rock that still forms the shoreline. That is because it has been made to look like the natural rock (its colour is so far somewhat lighter but that will be addressed in the coming weeks and it will become 'more natural' through weathering) and also because it has been cleverly designed to look like a rocky area with a terracing feature through which it is easy to walk down from the acrylic ridge to the foreshore and proceed to the sea, unless one prefers access to the sea through a few platforms that will create direct access between the sandy part and the sea.
One of those platforms will be accessible by wheelchair users in line with the principle that there should be equal access for all, catering in the process for persons who have different abilities.
The beach area proper has a 'French drain' system installed through which water that seeps to it from the sea or because of the rain in water is filtered out back to the sea. As the system was being explained to me, I commented with the architects present - and they agreed - that the system seems to resemble that used in plant pots, except that in this case one is talking of a far larger area, and the system used is certainly more sophisticated!
A site that is over 150 m long and about 25 m wide is being radically changed from a degraded, neglected and unpopular area into one that has its recreational and tourism-related potential recognised and appreciated.
The money being spent is in itself a form of investment. It is calculated that over ten years, the project that would have cost us Lm500,000 to create will generate about 17 times that amount (Lm8.6 million) in operational profits for the private sector with tourism facilities in the area, and that same amount in revenue for the public exchequer as a result of the increased economic activity.
Improving Product Malta is crucial for our own sakes and for the benefit of the thousands of visitors we seek to welcome here every year. info@franciszammitdimech.com www.franciszammitdimech.com