It has long been a useful way of protecting local communities against the crime of burglary for house-owners to get together to set up their own ‘Neighbourhood Watch’ schemes.
The schemes lend themselves well to areas where most people know each other and where strangers behaving suspiciously stand out.
It only takes the minimum of organisation in conjunction with the police to get local Neighbourhood Watch schemes up and running.
Now, in an inspired move, Nikolay Lubnow, a German who has been living in Vittoriosa for the last three years, has come up with a most imaginative way of using the concept of ‘Neighbourhood Watch’ schemes to ensure that controversial planning applications coming up in particular neighbourhoods – in his case Vittoriosa and the Three Cities – do not get through the planning system by default.
Mr Lubnow and his wife have set up the ‘Cottonera PA Watch’, which they describe as a neighbourhood watch scheme, but one designed for construction overdevelopment rather than crime. Members who are joining the Cottonera PA Watch are encouraged to photograph, list and detail information about any new building projects in the relatively unspoilt fortified heritage cities of Vittoriosa, Senglea and Cospicua.
The couple were prompted into coming up with this inspired scheme when residents of Vittoriosa and Senglea were caught unawares by news that the American University of Malta (AUM) was planning an extension to their building at Number 1 Dock. The AUM authorities want to turn a public car park (in an area already hard-pressed for open spaces as well as public parking) to build dormitories for their students there.
They observed that although Malta’s planning system was very good at ensuring that all planning applications and documents are made public, many people overlook them, or miss the deadline for representations to be made, simply because they do not understand how to navigate the planning system information and are discouraged by the bureaucracy.
Mr Lubnow also learnt that Planning Authority case officers are under huge pressure. They have to deal with hundreds of cases each week and consequently he feels – with great tact and understatement – it may be understandable that “some decisions are questionable and not in the public interest”. He therefore sees it as helpful that citizens like him should take the opportunity to cast a critical look at as many projected building planning measures as possible and submit feedback as required.
He has taken this idea forward and turned it into a practical working proposition by creating a Facebook page with the aim of creating greater transparency about projected developments in an area redolent with history.
The aim of a PA Watch scheme is essentially to inform those affected about protecting the quality of life and heritage of their area. It is a scheme which other areas of Malta that are under threat from over-development should consider adopting. Cultural heritage NGOs, such as Din l-Art Ħelwa and Fondazzjoni għal Ambjent Aħjar – which make valiant attempts to place a lid on unsightly construction in historic village cores – cannot do it all on their own.
The encouragement of a network of other PA Watch schemes could make a vital contribution to ensuring controversial and unacceptable planning applications do not get through the planning system by default.