New fuel stations policy a positive change – Tara Cassar

The long-overdue review of the Fuel Service Stations Policy was finally published last Friday. The policy has been welcomed and with fair reason. Its predecessor had allowed for the take-up of thousands of square meters of rural land to make way for massive glitzy pumping stations. The old policy was one of a series of policy reviews issued between 2014 and 2016 that opened the floodgates for the environmental onslaught that followed.

One of the most significant changes introduced through the new Policy Guidance for Fuel Stations is that it only considers the relocation of existing fuel service stations. New fuel service stations have been outrightly prohibited. In this way, the revised policy has effectively capped the number of fuel service stations on the island. The new policy also prohibits extensions to existing fuel service stations that are located fully or partially in ODZ.

This is already a major reduction from that allowed in the superseded policy under which the Planning Authority could have considered both completely new fuel stations on unbuilt land falling outside the development zone, as well as extensions to existing fuel service stations lo

Now, under the new policy, any fuel service station that is deemed permissible cannot have a footprint that exceeds 1,000sqm, significantly limiting the potential land take-up.

cated in the ODZ. In both cases, the proposed fuel service stations were allowed to cover an area of up to 3,000sqm. This ridiculously high threshold meant that investors were not simply building fuelling stations but benefitting off the unique opportunity to commercialise the countryside through unlimited ancillary facilities, which the old policy not only enabled but encouraged.

Now, under the new policy, any fuel service station that is deemed permissible cannot have a footprint that exceeds 1,000sqm, significantly limiting the potential land take-up.

The new policy does not completely exclude relocating a fuel station from the urban area to a site that is ODZ. However, it sets a series of restrictions that in theory should make it highly unlikely for an unsuitable ODZ site to qualify. Like the previous policy, Areas of Containment and Industrial Areas can be considered, however, unlike the previous policy, sites adjacent or opposite to these areas do not also automatically qualify.

Most significantly, under the new policy, the only other ODZ sites that can be considered would need to be already legally committed to a development that is not related to agriculture or animal husbandry or any other rural use, and cannot be isolated or sporadic.

In addition, if the site were to qualify under this parameter it would then also have to be in an area that is not environmentally sensitive. The previous policy excluded some environmentally or culturally significant areas such as Areas of High Landscape Value, Special Areas of Conservations and Special Protection Areas. The new policy now also lists Areas of Ecological Importance, Sites of Scientific Importance and Tree Protection Areas, as being unacceptable.

The minimum mandatory distance between any scheduled property and a proposed fuel service station site has also increased significantly from 50m to 100m.

Another critical change implemented through the new policy is that now all applications require clearance from several additional authorities, most significantly, the Environment and Resources Authority. The ERA had opposed a number of the fuel service stations approved under the 2015 policy.

The proof of the pudding is in the eating, so how would one of the most objectionable applications, that is still pending a decision, fare under the new policy?

In April 2019, the PA had received an application for the relocation of the existing fuel service station in Pjazza San Nikola to a site outside of Siġġiewi’s development zone. Located in the very heart of Siġġiewi’s village core, the existing fuel service station proposed for relocation is without a doubt having a negative impact on the surrounding built environment, and in that sense, does qualify under the new policy for relocation. However, more crucially, the ODZ site onto which the relocation is being proposed, does not.

The proposed new site has a footprint of over 1,800sqm and is therefore already over the 1,000sqm threshold. Even so, if the development were to be reduced, the application should still be refused under the new policy since the ODZ site onto which the relocation is being proposed is not within an Area of Containment, nor an Industrial Area. The site is also not legally committed to any development. In fact, the only building found on the site is a small rural property. As confirmed by the applicant, the rest is agricultural land.

Due to the restrictive parameters set through the new Policy Guidance for Fuel Stations, the ODZ site is not one onto which an existing fuel service station can be relocated, and therefore cannot be developed through this policy.

It required over two years of vociferous protesting from Moviment Graffitti and other eNGOs, as well as a change of administration, for this review to be implemented. It is now hoped that the positive shift towards the prioritization of the state of the environment that this policy represents, will continue to reflect in the Authority’s broader approach to planning.