Plans to build a roof over a thoroughfare leading to the Santa Venera tunnels have inched forward, with the Environment Ministry having commissioned geotechnical studies scheduled for early next year. 

The studies will help engineers and architects determine the exact types of interventions needed onsite to build the structures needed to roof over the area.

Times of Malta reported on the stalled project last August, writing at the time that residents were losing hope of the project ever seeing the light of day after discovering that authorities had done nothing to advance the plans after announcing them in 2019. 

The plans would see an area 13,000 square metres in size roofed over to reduce traffic pollution from cars travelling on Regional Road for Santa Venera residents, with the covered area turned into a sprawling roof garden. 
 
“This is about giving back the people a green way of life that in some areas has been taken away from them in the name of progress. We are committed to improved environmental wellbeing, that through such innovative projects can still go hand in hand with Malta’s continuous economic advancements”,  Environment Minister Aaron Farrugia said on Saturday when announcing plans to move ahead with geotechnical studies for the project. 

Urban greening 

Farrugia also announced that urban greening plans for sites in Ħamrun, Mosta and Qormi have been delegated to a new arm of state-run waste management firm Wasteserv. 

Greenserv is a new urban greening project implementation arm within WasteServ that will focus on dense urban areas that require transformation, areas that over the years have developed into predominantly grey spaces characterised by traffic and other aspects that negatively impinge on people’s quality of life. 

New Wasteserv arm Greenserv.

Its first projects will be in Ħamrun, Qormi and Mosta, where authorities have identified sites which will be the subject of a urban greening project to convert traffic thoroughfares into what the Environment Ministry describes as “green havens”. 

Authorities had said last June when announcing the plans that the projects would centre on Triq il-Wied in Qormi, Vjal Indipendenza in Mosta and the Ħamrun housing estate. The Mosta site is now expected to shift to an alternative location, with parliamentary secretary Alex Muscat saying that the new location would open up an area that is currently out-of-bounds to the public. 

The three projects are expected to cost just under €4 million to implement in total and the Environment Ministry says they will serve as blueprints for larger urban greening projects in the future. 

They will be funded through the National Development and Social Fund (NDSF), which invests money earned through Malta’s golden passport scheme.