When the Labour Party unveiled its electoral promise to invest €700 million over seven years to create green spaces in urban places, the announcement was greeted with widespread approval. Seeing photomontages of green oases in crowded city centres and the promise of tree afforestation projects was refreshing, especially after Ian Borg’s Bolsonaro-like period of tree destruction and land take-up.

Unfortunately, these visions of green lungs soon dissipated in the cold light of the post-election period. Because while these urban parklets bubble away on the back burner, the government is allowing the take-up of public open spaces in a number of ways. There is the constant urbanisation of ODZ land by means of the many approvals of planning applications, with the Planning Commission going out of its way to approve permits.

Then there is the ubiquitous encroachment of our promenades, pavements and streets with tables and chairs and ugly enclosures, even when these are expressly forbidden by law. Despite all the grand announcements about open spaces, health and well-being, the most basic access to pavements, walkways, fresh air and countryside is being denied on a daily basis.

The authorities are in a deep coma when it comes to enforcement or, maybe, they are too exhausted projecting green urban lungs which we can’t get to and which will inevitably be encroached upon by more kiosks and tables and chairs.

The finance minister has announced a spending review. This will be an exercise carried out across ministries and departments to try and “trim the fat” or eliminate needless expenditure. It doesn’t come a moment too soon. The minister might consider scrutinising the slew of direct orders being dished out from certain ministries, especially those of the former transport minister Ian Borg.

Direct orders should only be issued in cases of extreme urgency occasioned by unforeseeable events. However, these rules are being disregarded with an attitude of utter contempt. Take the half a million euros awarded to one lucky company for tents and apparatus related to the glitzy Metro launch. Was that a case of extreme urgency? Didn’t the minister have any idea that he was going to have a launch? Considering that he’s a man of such choreographed publicity shots, wasn’t this event

about the future of Malta’s mass transit system, such a surprise to be organised with such urgency? Was it such an unforeseeable event? Of course it wasn’t. 

The sheer profligacy – or worse – is glaring at us from the pages of The Malta Government Gazzette listing multiple, repeat direct orders. If this contemptuous disregard of all principles of good governance and public procurement rules cannot be reined in, then this spending review will just be another useless exercise.

There’s a transformation which takes place when someone becomes minister for transport and infrastructure. From putting up a (shallow) pretence of concern for eco-friendliness and sustainability, there is the adoption of a full-on ‘Concrete is King mentality’ and the insistence that only more infrastructural projects can catapult Malta into the 21st century.

The authorities are in a deep coma when it comes to enforcement- Claire Bonello

In this vein, we have Aaron Farrugia stepping into Borg’s shoes and desperately trying to assume the gung-ho, ‘doer’ persona of his predecessor.

First, he regaled us with declarations about imminent land reclamation. Then, he told us that he would be launching some controversial projects in the near future. Many assumed that these projects were those which were being pursued by Borg, before he got shunted to foreign affairs.

They include the ghastly Msida Creek project, where a flyover tops a cemetery for cars, and the Mrieħel flyover, which will gobble up more ODZ agricultural land and which was vehemently opposed by residents and ENGOs. 

When asked  about the latter, Farrugia justified it by referring to the National Transport Plan for 2025.

According to Farrugia, the transport plan lists the improvement of the Mrieħel bypass as the eighth most important project Malta needs to carry out on the main road network forming part of the TEN-T European Network.

The local plan requiring more safety measures on the Mrieħel bypass was also a factor, the minister said.

All very well and good but none of the plans quoted by the minister specifically mention a massive flyover taking up thousands of square metres of ODZ land. The local plan states that the right turn from the Mrieħel industrial estate access road should be eliminated and that there should be safe pedestrian crossing facilities, preferably by means of an underpass. There is absolutely no mention of a flyover.

As for the National Transport Master Plan, it requires the drawing up of a comprehensive master plan for Mrieħel.

This should include forecasting trips generated, assessing impacts on the transport network and drawing up an appropriate transport strategy (including parking standards, traffic management, public transport and facilities for cycling and walking) to be implemented for the area.

What’s more,  appropriate mitigating measures will also need to be planned to ensure that the surrounding urban areas are not negatively impacted by traffic generation. 

There’s no sign of this Mrieħel master plan, despite the high-rises being built in the area.

As usual, we are building in haste, only to repent at leisure. Then, we wonder why the country is in the state it is in.