![]() ![]() ![]() The scheduling of the building would have prevented the Planning Authority from assessing the proposal in terms of the Height Limitation Adjustment Policy for Hotels. Grade 2 protection normally allows internal alterations to buildings but precludes substantial additions to the fabric of the building. The hotel’s EIA confirms that the officers’ mess would merit a Grade 1 level of protection, as was the case with similar buildings in Pembroke, but only recommended Grade 2 protection because of the irreversible changes made to the building when it was transformed into a hotel in the 1980s. “No additional floors over the third floor will be allowed over this landmark building,” the brief concluded. The PA’s own Fort Cambridge Development Brief, approved in January 2006, described the barracks as a “landmark building” to be retained due to its historical and architectural importance, serving as a buffer between new, higher development and the surrounding residential blocks. But most of the building’s external fabric remains intact. The conversion of the barracks into a hotel in the 1980s resulted in the removal of the main porch on the north façade, and the conversion of existing rooms into double bedrooms. The Fort Cambridge officers’ mess was built between 19. The EIA’s heritage report clearly indicated that the building deserved Grade 2 scheduling, the same level of protection recently granted to Palazzina Vincenti in St Julian’s. It also foresees extensive restoration works and the recreation of the original courtyard of the building.īut an environmental impact assessment (EIA) for the project commissioned by the developers had warned that the integration of the façade into the lower floors of the high-rise hotel means its “mere existence as a free-standing structure will be forever lost” and that the military heritage of the area would be “further de-contextualised”. The Planning Authority board will be taking a final decision on the high-rise development proposed by developers GAP, on 13 July.Īs proposed the development will retain most of the façade of the 19th century building and integrate it in the high-rise hotel. Had the Planning Authority scheduled the building as requested by the Sliema local council in 2015, it would not be able to approve the development in terms of the policy regulating hotel heights. The tower hotel will be erected above the historic barracks, which formerly formed part of the now-shuttered Holiday Inn hotel. A case officer recommending approval of a 31-storey hotel on the 19th century Fort Cambridge barracks barely mentions the proposed scheduling of the building pending since 2015.
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