Just when you think that speculative building on virgin land was a thing of the past in Spain, the Mayor of Níjar proves us all wrong.
If you have never been to the virgin beaches of Monsul and Los Genoveses in the Parque Natural de Níjar/Cabo de Gata, you have seriously missed out.
Being within a natural park, there are no hotels, bars or even electricity pylons; just the beaches and hinterland as they have stood for decades; centuries, even. No wonder they chose this location for period-piece film locations.
But the Mayor of Níjar – the whole park to the east of Cabo de Gato falls within his municipality – has decided that the very entrance to the gravel road that leads to the beaches is in great need of houses and a shopping centre.
The access road leads from the lovely village of San José, which is a municipal dependency and one that has not escaped the type of speculative building typical of the boom years. Most of the new houses in San José stand empty, which is hardly surprising because the village has an off-season population of only 750 people, which swells to around 3,000 in the summer.
The province of Almería is mostly desert and water is a scarce commodity, so it should come as no surprise that little San José struggles to provide mains water for its winter population, so imagine what the summer is like.
Yet the Mayor considers that San José needs even more housing, and slap bang on the access road for the park.
Local ecologist-minded group, Amigos del Parque are demanding that the Mayor drop the project and warn him that the Regional High Court has already declared the site for the project as non-development land, but when a politician smells money…
You can make your voice heard, too, if you feel strongly enough about it by signing an online petition against the project, as I personally have – San José was my Maria’s favourite summer holiday spot and we used to go each year for a week.
More info HERE regarding signing the petition and HERE for our feature article on the park.
(News: San Jose, Almeria, Andalucia)