When it was announced that the Costa Tropical was going to receive 18m euros for tourist infrastructure projects, everybody was over the moon. The next step was to submit proposals.

The two major projects that were approved, however, have still not got off the ground, for two entirely different reasons.

In the first case, Motril Port Authorities submitted a project for a Cruise-ship Reception Centre. The idea was to convert the space at one end of the port where two old warehouses stand into this centre, which was to make the arrival of cruise-ship passengers – lucrative visitors – more pleasing. The price? Two million euros.

However, with the rapid take-off of the Armas Ferry service between Motril and Melilla, the dockside space for the cruise centre was hurriedly adapted for this need. Consequently all the approved paperwork for the cruise-ship centre has to be rewritten and resubmitted for approval, not to mention finding new space for it within the port.

The other grand project involves Salobreña castle. The whole monument was to get a complete facelift and the cracks sorted out where part of it is moving.

It was the previous Salobreña administration that put forward the proposal, but when the new administration got in they found that their predecessors hadn’t even drawn up a project for it. Consequently, although the money is panting to be spent in both cases, it is just sitting their twiddling its proverbial thumbs.

So on the one side, much needed municipal infrastructure (flooding/drains) is lacking in both towns, but will have to wait because there are not funds, yet on the other side, projects to improve the tourist attractions of the two municipalities are awash with funds but no projects to use them.

(News: Salobrena/Motril, Costa Tropical, Granada, Andalucia)