I left a comment on an excellent post by Ramona Depares that dealt with the proposed Paceville revamp (Paceville revamp my foot). When I decided to move out of my parents’ house in Paceville, before I came to Luxembourg, some weird homing device in my brain led me to choose an apartment in Paceville. Crazy right? It had nothing to do with being close to the mater and pater – they’d be shifting base to Gozo anyway upon retirement. It’s just that Paceville has always felt like an alien part of Malta – a metropolitan suburb if you will that manages to be a cut off from the reality of the rest of the island thanks to its peculiarities.
Sure, Paceville had the traffic jams and the noise but its also the place where you can pop out to have a snack at 3am and observe the drunk ramblings of the latest visitor it has received with arms wide open. Paceville has a life of its own that no other place in Malta can emulate. It is a life that grew in a test tube in spite of and not thanks to any controlled civic plans. For a long time in the nineties “Paceville” was a synonym of the doorstep to hell … mentioned in the same breath as Satanic Masses, Drunken Hedonism and other pleasures of the flesh while enjoying star status on the earliest episodes of Xarabank. The more it grew the less it could be controlled and no attempt at competition (like that sore excuse of a rival called Bugibba) could even dream of stealing its show.
The suburb that never sleeps is now subject of a proposed revamp. Revamps under the nationalist government have come to mean an investment in street furniture, a couple of coats of paint and every now and then a pedestrian zone replete with kitschy statues. Tenders galore in fact. Which is the last thing that Paceville needs. Here is the comment I left on Ramona’s blog for it says the rest of what I have to say. (Featured video: Mike Spiteri – Paceville – Malta Song for Europe 1992).
Great post Ramona, and this coming from a Pacevillian through and through. I am not for an authoritarian, ultra-regulated approach because entertainment is by its very nature anti-regulation. You cannot create entertainment through regulation.
Having said that I see two early solutions to the problems of Paceville. First the basic interventions that you highlighted and that are absent. Upper St George’s Road (Spinola is not Paceville – yes those 500m make a difference) has long begged for a multi-purpose intervention centre – police, first aid and information office. Yes. Information office. A center of fun bang in the middle of Paceville – tickets to nightclubs, information about special offers and bands/djs performing in the area , where to watch your football etc. You know keep an eye on what’s happening by being part of it.
Then get the taxis/transport people to pull their act together and finally the most difficult part – incentivise Paceville business to get out of its stupid and crass mentality of the mediocre race to the bottom. Entertainment as I said earlier does not come out of regulation. It does not obey rules. It plants itself in fertile and welcoming soil. Strictly speaking Paceville has never been anything superlative (although we have all had our great nights out there) but it has to fight hard against the possibility of becoming once again a synonym for the doorstep to hell as it was in the early nineties.
