After an interruption of almost five months, work on the site of the new historical and cultural museum is resuming tomorrow, Tuesday 31 August 2010. Demolishing had started on April 7, 2010, but was suspended after difficulties arose concerning part of the property.This problem has been resolved and work on the Fondazzjoni Belt Victoria’s project can now resume at a fast pace.
Asked about the construction priorities, project coordinator Mgr Joseph Farrugia – on whose initiative as archpriest the museum venture had started way back in 1999 – said that it is the Fondazzjoni Belt Victoria’s intention to conclude the construction phase within three months.The site plans, submitted in 2006, had won Mepa approval a year later. And, had it not been for the hitches that cropped up earlier this year, the probability is that we would have been far ahead in the implimentation of this ERDF-supported project.
FBV chair Antoine Vassallo stated that the Project Working Group is rearing to go – hand in hand with the coordinator – towards the realization of what is perhaps the most important cultural project undertaken to date on the island of Gozo by a non-governmental organisation.Mr Vassallo is also project leader and so has quite onerous responsibilities!
The Working Group met on Saturday, immediately after the agreement – which thus brought the hiatus to an end – was signed under the auspices of St George’s archpriest, Mgr Pawlu Cardona. The project coordinator’s proposal that resumption of construction work should be undertaken immediately was approved.The architect Mr Saviour Micallef raised relevant issues that were either immediately resolved or included in the agenda for a session on the morrow.
This was held on Sunday morning between the project coordinator, the project leader, the architect and the the director of the construction company, which had been adjudicated the tenders. Various procedural matters were assigned and Mgr Farrugia is notifying the neighbours, besides actually coordinating the various tasks involved, possibly not all foreseen! Mr Micallef detailed the immediate excavation phases and the modes of demolition to keep inconveniences to a minimum.
A plenary meeting of the Working Group is being held on Wednesday 1 September 2010, at the FBV offices at Dar Leħen il-Belt Victoria on St George’s Square.
While www.fbvgozo.org.mt will continue to give information about the works in process, a dedicated one will shortly be online to help all those interested keep track of the project and to provide space for other information and interaction.It can be described as the forerunner of the fully-fledged official website of the historical and cultural museum to be inaugurated by 2012.
