Noise levels in Valletta

Early last week, I was invited to dinner in Valletta and we were seated at a table in the open space in front of the restaurant. I will not mention the name of the restaurant but I will state that I found it extremely difficult to have a conversation with my host during dinner as the music coming from the nearby restaurant was far too loud. 

Ironically, my digital watch kept showing a notice that the noise level was far too loud for my ears.

Despite many protests by the residents of Valletta that these restaurant owners have turned Valletta into another ‘Paceville’ area and that the noise level going on till 1am, the authorities gave a deaf ear to all these protests. 

It is really sad.

The directors of the Real Madrid Club have cancelled concerts which were to take place at the Santiago Bernabeu because neighbours complained of excessive noise levels. Photo: Shutterstock.com

On the other hand, many football lovers must have seen the new stadium that Real Madrid built, which stadium was also designed to be converted to organise concerts and other events when there would not be a football match.

The first concert event was inaugurated on May 30 by Taylor Swift and many concerts by other artists were then performed in July and August. 

Well, the residents who live in the vicinity of this magnificent stadium protested to the noise level at night emanating from these concerts. 

The directors of the Real Madrid Club  unilaterally agreed to cancel all future concerts till March 2025, despite all the bookings that were already in place, in order to satisfy the request of residents and find a solution to dampen the noise level that would emerge from these future concerts. 

This decision was taken despite the millions of euros that were already spent to create such an environment.  

Such a decision was taken totally against the commercial interests of the club but fully in favour of the residents around the stadium. In this situation, there was not an issue of pleasing voters but simply a civic duty of a responsible club. 

I hope the Maltese authorities and Valletta local council take note of such a civic commitment and take note of the Valletta residents’ concerns.

Francis Vassallo – Qormi