With the local elections set for next spring, ex-Mayor of Almuñécar, Juan Carlos Benavides gave his views on how things have gone recently for Almuñécar.

The points he covered were the 7-star hotel, the 5-star one in San Sebastian, Rules Dam irrigation pipelines, the Municipal Market, work on Avenida de Andalucia, the La Herradura Paseo, the proposed 2-way traffic for the road between the Paseo del Altillo and the Peñon and the Municipal Music School… in none of them has he had anything positive to say about the Mayor and her cabinet, as can be expected.

He considers, for example, that the two above-mentioned hotel projects were bungled and lost. He criticised the decisions taken on the Avenida de Andalucía thoroughfare; the first phase started just before this summer even though the project had been approved, he claims three and a half years ago.

He considers the project for the beach road between the paseo and the rock to be “nonsense,” pointing out that towns and cities around the world are moving towards getting car traffic out of their urban centres whilst Almuñécar appears bent upon the opposite.

He says that it is a lie that permission has been obtained by Costas (Madrid) to alter the said structure and now that the vegetation is finally taking off on the new Paseo del Altillo some of it is going to get ripped up.

As for the Municipal Market, he considers that the Mayor is intent upon letting it deteriorate further and thus have the justification to demolish it completely.

Summing up, the elections are now close enough for political parties to take up positions and grab big sticks to hit each other with, whilst in Almuñécar, just like in every other municipality all over Spain, funds are being found for a frenzy of public works.

(News: Almunecar, Costa Tropical, Granada, Andalucia)