Controversy continues over the renovation of the former headquarters in Madrid of the State Meteorological Agency (AEMET) for its conversion into a meteorological museum. The rehabilitation of what is also known as Castillete del Retiro has been the subject of a complaint filed with the urban discipline, an organization dependent on the Madrid City Council led by José Luis Martínez-Almeida, which reveals some inconsistencies in its construction. The document is signed by Jesús San Vicente, architect and president of the Madrid College of Architects group NexoCoam.
The document, to which Somos Madrid has had access, attacks “aspects that contradict what was approved and in any case are contrary to the comprehensive protection that the property has in the municipal cataloging.” The reform (which has AEMET itself as promoter) had to follow the prescriptions indicated by the Commission for the Protection of Historical, Artistic and Natural Heritage (CPPHAN), the entity responsible for issuing the favorable report for the project.
This report arrived in October 2017, after a first assessment in 2016 ruled out the initiative because it did not consider “the proposed configuration for the roof extension to be appropriate, taking into account the level of classification of the building.” With subsequent adjustments, the rehabilitation finally received the go-ahead, but subject to a series of obligations: “Given that it is a building with comprehensive protection, the elevation of the two existing towers to house the elevator and staircase is not permitted. original, and another alternative must be studied for the implementation of the elevator that minimizes the impact on the protected building.”
According to the project presented, this elevator had to be circular so that the emerging volume on the roof respected the opaque cylinder of the original project. “Clearly the elevator that emerges, in which some glass volumes are also exhibited (type panoramic), does not at all conform to what was approved,” Jesús San Vicente points out in his complaint.
The viewpoint on the cornice, one of the most criticized aspects of the renovation, also moves away from the original plan, according to the architect: “This volume had an elegant section with lattice beams and a cantilever that allowed us to minimize the visual impact of the glass. façade, with hardly any cornice. However, the volume executed has a rude cornice finish with a gutter and sheet metal frieze about 50 centimeters high. “All this represents a visual attack that seriously distorts the appearance of the finishing with characteristic battlements of the Castle.”
As the complaint illustrates, another of the sections in which the work does not comply with the initial proposal is that of the air conditioning installations: “As can be seen in the photo, the appearance of these devices, without any type of visual protection, does not “It seems like a very appropriate solution given the criteria with which the CPPHAN requires concealment through slatted screens or any other proposal.”
San Vicente elaborates on the reasons for his complaint in conversation with this newspaper: “For this type of actions, in which you depend on the CPPHAN, they usually even ask for your identity card. But here we see that that same control has not existed. Where there used to be a staircase, they have added an elevator. The original coffer had some different holes that meant that the windows did not coincide with those of the tower, so they put the concrete staircase there.” From his point of view, the result “is a Frankenstein, it is a desecration.”
Inspection request without municipal or regional response
The architect concludes his complaint, in which he includes images of the original project that demonstrate the divergences with the final performance, requesting “an inspection of the works.” It requires that the intervention “be consistent with the integrity of the approved project.” The works, whose final execution was approved in 2021, have had a budget of 3.7 million euros provided by the Ministry of Ecological Transition.
The request from San Vicente, which acts on behalf of the NexoCoam group, was presented on September 18. Since then, according to his account, there have been no developments in the process. Sources from the Culture area of the municipal Executive consulted by this means indicate that, despite the local nature of the CPPHAN, the opinion was signed by the General Directorate of Heritage of the Community of Madrid. In turn, the Ministry of Culture of the Government chaired by Isabel Díaz Ayuso states that “if a work has been done that does not correspond to what was approved, the City Council can initiate a sanctioning file.”
This newspaper has also contacted AEMET, as the entity promoting the project, to find out its position. At the moment they have not answered the questions raised. The organization did speak out when the first criticisms arose about the new appearance of the Castillete. They claimed to be “very surprised” by criticism “without context” and defended that the process has been “respectful and careful”, even using “the materials of its construction” in order to create “a museum that makes visible the history of the institution.” ”. They affirm that “if you don’t like its aesthetics, that’s how it was and that’s how it has been rebuilt.”
“The building was in a state of semi-ruin and in danger of collapsing its floors and roofs. All works had a license from the Madrid City Council and the approval of the Heritage Commission,” they added. And they added: “Rehabilitation is not only a concept that tries to mimic and recover the original image of a building, but to adapt its original use and transform it to give it a new life according to new needs and meanings that society demands. Otherwise, it would have been a false recovery lacking content and, therefore, doomed to failure and abandonment.”
The history of the first AEMET house
The enclosure is more than just a curiosity within the Retiro Park. The AEMET had its first headquarters there and was a pioneering scientific center during the second half of the 19th century and part of the 20th century. The Castillete, also known as Telégrafo de la Elefanta or Retiro Castle, was presumably designed by José María Mathé, Head of the National Telegraph Lines. It was built to house an optical telegraph, the head of the Valencia-Barcelona line. The logic of the optical telegraph was to create a chain of towers with visibility between the points, so that each one repeated the message of the previous one until its destination.
After the decline of technology, new uses were sought for the unique construction, serving as an electric telegraphy school for a short period of time and, later, as the headquarters of the Central Meteorological Institute, the historical seed of the current AEMET.
The first steps of AEMET date back to 1887, when the Central Meteorological Institute was created by royal decree, which over the years changed its name until reaching its current incarnation, a continuous source of information through its website and social networks. . Its first director, Augusto Arcimis Werhle, proposed to the Ministry of Development that it request the Madrid City Council to transfer the El Retiro optical telegraph tower, in which he installed some instruments that he had acquired during his trips to France.
On the ground floor of the tower were the barometers, the anemometers on the terrace, the thermometers in the garden and the rain gauges on its south façade, about 15 meters away from the construction. And the facilities included the land surrounding the tower, which was expanded. In 1913, 10,000 square meters of surroundings were added and over the years new facilities were built.
The construction is also known as Torre de la Elefanta, a name that comes from the “Elefanta Bath”, a pond from the mid-19th century located near the Castillete. It was used to bathe these animals from the nearby Menagerie. Antonio Cabañas Cámara, AEMET meteorologist in El Retiro, prepared a report in 2021 to request the recovery of the pond, in which the zoo animals initially bathed and, later, the dogs of the people of Madrid.
The place was left within the land attached to the meteorological organization in the aforementioned expansion of 1913, suffering progressive abandonment until its final closure in 1965. Already in 1997 it was proposed to convert it into a Meteorology Museum and in 2007 an urban planning license was granted to rehabilitate the building , but the project was never launched until recent years.
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