A scheduled Art Deco town house in Sliema's Tigné neighbourhood is set to be replaced by apartments and shopfronts, after a planning appeals tribunal concluded that only part of the building is protected.
The application, PA/10573/17, filed by Keith Attard Portughes in 2017 with Ruben Sciortino as the architect, called for the demolition of existing buildings on the site and the construction of 27 apartments, one penthouse, a commercial area some 998 square metres large and 50 underground parking spaces.
The site is a sprawling corner house that lies at the intersection of Triq Tigné, Triq Sant Antnin and Triq Pace in Sliema.
According to the PA's website, its facades were given Grade 2 planning protection in June 2018.
Grade 2 scheduling is the second-highest level of protection afforded by the PA.
EPRT accepts appeal
The PA had in 2019 initially refused to grant the applicant a permit, chiefly citing the fact that the proposed development would change both the internal and external appearance of the building and damage cultural heritage.
Portughes had appealed the PA's decision to refuse his application and took it to the Environment and Planning Tribunal, which accepted the appeal and sent the application back to the PA in 2021 to reconsider, albeit with some amended drawings.
The tribunal ruled that only two sides of the property's facade - those on Triq Tigné and Triq Sant Antnin - enjoyed planning protection through the PA's Grade 2 schedule classification.
These, they said should be retained. The remaining facade on Triq Pace must respect the design and material of the scheduled ones if it must be rebuilt, among some other conditions.
Case officer advises refusal and is duly ignored
When plans were sent back to the PA for evaluation, they showed that the development would rise by five floors on top of the existing two, with the interiors to be gutted and redeveloped.
Last year, the planning directorate’s case officer, when considering the conditions of the appeal and the revised plans, again recommended the application for refusal, again saying that the proposal would alter the scheduled building and detract from its value.
The case officer also said that the plans ran counter to policies that did not allow the floor space of planned offices to exceed 75 square metres.
Despite this, the Planning Commission made up of Stephania Baldacchino, Anthony Camilleri and Mireille Fsadni, voted to approve the application last week.