After decades of filling the coast with cement and swimming pools, Catalonia is putting the brakes on massive urbanization on the seafront. The Generalitat has initially approved this Thursday another urban master plan (this now mainly affects the coast of Tarragona) to avoid the construction of 46,800 new homes in 30 municipalities. For practical purposes, it means that all building licenses and urban projects in the initial phase that fly over 105 sectors of tourist municipalities such as Sitges (Garraf), El Vendrell (Baix Penedès) or Torredembarra (Tarragonès) have been frozen until the final approval of the rule. The preliminary project follows in the footsteps of another already approved more than a year ago for the Costa Brava (Girona), which prevented the construction of 15,000 new homes, and also another in the Pyrenees, which did so with 8,500. The Catalan coast, admits the Government itself, is “at the limit”.
The general director of Spatial Planning, Agustí Serra, explained this Thursday at a press conference that what is going to be avoided is building as big as the city of Lleida. “We want to bring order,” Serra said, adding that after decades of over-urbanization, Catalonia has to reverse the situation in a context of climate emergency. “It is a very important step to remedy the unbridled urbanism of previous decades”, added the general director.
The plan does not stop the works of new developments that were already under construction, but rather changes the classification of 4,700 hectares to prevent developers from initiating plans to build them. It does affect seven projects for new developments that were in a first initial phase, although the works had not started. “We have carried out a technical engineering process to avoid financial liability with the promoters,” Serra said, adding that some businessmen on the Costa Brava have initiated legal proceedings against the Generalitat after last year’s veto, although he has not revealed which ones. .
However, the draft will not prevent more cranes from appearing on the coast in the future: the reduction of licenses for 46,800 possible new homes is on a total figure of 106,000 possible. Therefore, if the promoters and municipalities have the will, along the 300 kilometers of coastline between Malgrat de Mar and Alcanar, 60,000 more houses can still be built in the coming decades.
Beyond the total number of licenses that has finally been paralyzed, the plan represents a before and after in the urban policy on the seafront throughout the community: from Cap de Creus to the mouth of the Ebro river. The plan includes the thesis defended by geographers, geologists and environmental activists that the Mediterranean community must stop the construction not only because of the profound and irreparable visual impact it entails, but also for safety.
The Generalitat admitted through a report commissioned last year that poor planning was taking the Catalan coast “to the limit” and warned of the risk of flooding in municipalities and million-dollar infrastructures, such as the Rodalies R1. “There were many flood zones (on which it could be built) that have been stopped in municipalities such as El Vendrell or Cambrils”, said Serra.
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The Generalitat also warned in the 2021 report that 60% of the coast of the community is urbanized in its first 100 meters. The document, prepared by the Advisory Council for the Sustainable Development of Catalonia (Cads), an advisory body to the Government on sustainability, also confirmed that only 20% of the coast is safe from rising sea levels. A paradigmatic example and the most serious recent case was the flooding of Alcanar and Ulldecona, two municipalities that border the Valencian Community, and which caused damage to dozens of businesses and homes. An old fishing village converted to family tourism, the municipality paid for the consequences of having built decades ago on ravines that overflowed after a storm.
The urban review plan, due to a matter of competences, does not affect the Barcelona metropolitan area. The Maresme region, with 15 affected municipalities, is where the potential number of homes will be reduced less. This is due, explain sources from the Department of the Territory, to the fact that the area is already excessively built up, so there are only a few hectares left to declassify.
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