Can The Can

For an island that is literally built on construction (in addition to tourism), there is not always a glowing record in respect of public works. The Palma metro fiasco is perhaps the most prominent, but Alcúdia has also experienced its own little local difficulty.

The Can Ramis redevelopment was meant to have been something of a signature transformation, a statement of local, municipal pride. There were glossy brochures of what was to come - a new bus terminal, a new office for tourist information, a café (always a café). Well, they all might still yet come. But at present, all there is to show for the demolition of the old Can Ramis houses by the market square is a rather nice new pedestrianised "plaza" area and a building site, a building site which, apart from the presence of a couple of guys from Telefonica this morning, was singularly conspicuous by its lack of activity. This is not suspension-of-works-because-of-the-tourist-season lack of activity, this is lack of activity through ... well, through what exactly?

There is a fine old rumpus going on as a consequence of the way-behind-time re-development. From what I can make out from the local Spanish press and from what I've been told, the town hall had parted with a goodly amount of the final budget for the works, albeit that the Council of Mallorca is stumping up much of the ante. The money had gone to the builders, Crespi, a local firm and a not insignificant employer. Except they may no longer be. I was told, with a degree of certainty, that the company had gone bust, but the press reports of what is coming out of the town hall seem to infer these are rumours. I would have thought the town hall might have been keen to establish if there were real grounds to these rumours, given that the bulk of the 1.5 million euros had already been paid.

Needless to say, the opposition political party, the Partido Popular, blames the coalition of nationalists and socialists in the town hall. And there does at least seem to be some acceptance that the original budget was wrong. Wherever the responsibility lies for the mess that is Can Ramis, the fact is that it can't just be left as a building site. The mayor, while reminding everyone that the new plaza allows for an improved flow of tourists to the market each Tuesday and Sunday, admits that the works have to be finished and cannot be a building site all season. Well, it's going to be a building site all this season, that's for sure. As can be seen from the photo, there is nothing there at all. On closer inspection, there are some foundations but that's about it.

Still, I guess it's like this anywhere. At least, they are not building an Olympic village or Olympic stadia or any things as daft as those. Now there's real public works balls-up in the making.


QUIZ
Yesterday was Steppenwolf who took their name from which author? And because I still quite like the title as questions as well, who did today's title?

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