An application for planning permission for 57 apartments, shops and offices will ruin the narrowest streets of St Julian’s Urban Conservation Area, the environment NGO Flimkien għal Ambjent Aħjar warned on Sunday. 

The environment group said the development is planned for a site between St Elias Street and Birkirkara Hill.

It will generate a huge increase of traffic in an area which cannot even cope with existing volumes, while increasing air pollution and irrevocably undermining the quality of life and health of residents, the NGO said. 

Astrid Vella, FAA coordinator, explained at a press conference on the site that the project should be covered by a masterplan/outline plan for the whole site not piecemeal applications for parts of the site that seek to avoid essential studies.

St Julian’s Mayor Albert Buttigieg spoke out strongly against the further commercialisation of St Julian’s at the cost of residents’ wellbeing. 

He said that this project would ruin the urban conservation atmosphere of St Julian’s oldest zone, and would reduce this area to an extension of Paceville.

He urged residents to attend a hearing of this application at the Planning Authority on Wednesday morning.