Wied Qirda works given go-ahead... months after works started
Infrastructure Malta has finally been granted a permit to carry out works at Wied Qirda but the state agency has been ordered to clean up the environmental mess its illegal roadworks left behind in the protected valley.
The Environment and Resources Authority issued an environmental permit for the agency to reinstate part of the valley, which has been widened, to remove construction debris from the valley bed and to carry out other works intended to restore it.
An Infrastructure Malta spokesman told Times of Malta that now that the permit has been issued, the agency can go ahead with its project “to make this part of the valley better than it was”.
Last November, the environmental watchdog had stopped the roads agency from continuing extensive roadwork without a permit in the scenic area between Żebbuġ and Siġġiewi. Despite stop orders affixed to machinery on site, workers simply removed them and continued work they had planned. They ignored requests from the environmental watchdog to stop and police had to be called in.
ERA’s stop notice said the works were in breach of several provisions of the Environmental Protection Act, since they were taking place in a site of...