Abandoned St Philips Hospital Should Be Regenerated For Public Use, St Venera Minority Leader Suggests
St Venera’s Minority Leader Darren Carabott brought forward suggestions of regeneration for the abandoned St Philip’s hospital to be fit for public use.
This comes after yet another recorded incident of vandalism inside the abandoned space, where just this week nine teens were arrested because of setting fires inside rooms of the building.
St Venera’s Mayor Stephen Sultana told Lovin Malta that regular meetings are being held with police in order to combat such behaviour, however, Carabott believes more needs to be done.
“It’s been more than 10 years since this hospital was shut down, and the property was left as is. On an island like ours, where space is limited, why aren’t we looking into expropriating and making use of these facilities for public use?,” Carabott questioned.
The Minority Leader also addressed that it’s no secret what tends to go on inside the hospital, with many videos surfacing online on platforms such as TikTok depicting people breaking in and filming the space.
“I think this is a good opportunity to have a nationwide discussion on the way forward to regenerate the area for public use,” he said.
“The government had briefly looked into making use of these facilities during the pandemic as a secondary hospital, but nothing came to fruition. Yet, why is the government limiting the public use of the property for medical purposes only?,” he inquired.
Carabott also shared his vision for the locality, saying that it has the potential to be a nationwide example for regenerating built-up densely populated areas in Malta, with St Venera now hitting almost 8,000 residents.
“Yet we lack open spaces, parking is a problem and furthermore we don’t even have a proper civic centre, a library, a functioning police station, an accessible Local Council and a proper health clinic. Aren’t these matters in the public interest, and shouldn’t the government have a solid basis for expropriation? I believe so,” he said.
He shared his imaginations for the site, in the case that it actually got to be regenerated, and used in conjuction with the proposed roofing of the St Venera tunnels which are close by.
“All the government has to do is sit down and discuss these ideas with the Local Councils, something which in my eight-year term as Local Councillor in Santa Venera never happened,” he said.
“We have the ideas, because we live and discuss such matters daily – yet Local Councils are not empowered to have their say,” he lamented.
Carabott also appealed that not just in St Venera, but around all of Malta, “we need to think outside of the box and regenerate such spaces in the public interest”.
What do you make of this?
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