Thursday, January 10, 2008

Demolition in Vera, Almería












Here's a picture of the home of a retired English family being demolished by Junta de Andalucía goons. The house had building permission, was connected to the water and electricity supplies and had been built four and a half years ago. The owners have now been left destitute.



The top photo comes from the local paper.



I went over there this morning and found the bulldozer still at work (second photo). There are several homes nearby and - according to a local TV channel - perhaps another ten are at risk.



The house in the picture has a name-plate affixed to the wall outside: 'Tranquilidad'.

A picture of Helen Prior, worried, angry, tired... and currently homeless.




....
In answer to a comment below about planning permissions.



The rules have changed recently regarding the rights of the town hall, being the local authority, to grant building licences (and make money from the permits). Now, the Junta de Andalucía has taken on this right and is in direct conflict with many town halls throughout Almería. They have even sanctioned this in a daring new plan - opposed by all the local town halls. The new 'plan', rather more fully known as the 'Plan de Ordenación Territorial del Levante Almeriense' (POTLA), designed by the Junta de Andalucía, sees this part of the autonomy as hotels and tourism. Towns are severly restricted in the number of homes they can now build. There is no reference in the POTLA to 'residential tourism'. In fact, the short-sighted document wants to provide cheap hotels to East European tourism (wow!) and to build a conference hall in Garrucha (where there are currently no hotels).

From the government buildings of San Telmo in Seville, occupied since time immemorial by the PSOE apparatus, Almería is too big a prize to leave to the Almerians.

We may see more demolitions, particularly in Cuevas, Vera and Albox - where the fault can be placed at the door of the PP or the PA. Meanwhile, in Carboneras (PSOE) the gigantic, empty hulk of the Hotel Algarrobico remains on the shore. Unfinished, unusable... yet undemolished.

4 comments:

Streetwise said...

Why was this house demolished if it had planning permission.

Eye on Spain said...

What a nightmare for the owners and other residents in similar positions. Have they gone to the press?? Something needs to be done. Things are getting totally out of hand.

gringo said...

There must be more to this than meets the eye, and hope that you can provide some more information. I would be very interested in knowing if there have been any Spanish owned homes demolished. Please can you keep on the case and if possible provide more follow ups as this develops.
This will send all the wrong signals to potential investors or retirees in Spain. This is quite plainly WRONG.

Unknown said...

Indeed why was this house demolished ? Diligience prevailed, they had been through the right channels ...... so it would seem that by going through the right channels you can still be wrong , whats the word for that ??? corruption ............