Here's a stat for you. Over the past ten years the number of tourists per annum in Mallorca has risen from just shy of six million to just shy of eleven million. Not quite a 100% increase, it's still one hell of an increase.
Such an abundance of tourists should have everyone jumping for joy. But not everyone is. Some are staring at beaches of the island, at roads, at treatment plants. Their expressions are ones of pain. How has it come to this? We know how. We know why. Mediterranean geopolitics and the advance of Airbnb (and others). We know the reasons. Nevertheless, an additional five million tourists in the space of a decade, 500k more each year: this is a massive increase.
It might be thought that the increase has been more concentrated than this. Go back ten years and the world was at the point of throwing itself off financial towers. But the crash didn't create a tourism wreck. It didn't enable tourism to truly set sail with a fair wind behind it, but nor was tourism becalmed. The numbers grew and then suddenly they exploded. There was the collision of collaborative economy internet portals, the firing of a terrorist's gun, and the sound of cash tills being reactivated through recovery. For some, this caused the perfect storm. For others, it was imperfect. Storm it was, though. And with storms come damage.
Crisis begat austerity. While recovery is all around, it is easy to forget that Spain and Mallorca are still labouring in the sludgy sand of parsimony. It took a constitutional manoeuvre and an alliance of political foes - the Partido Popular and PSOE - to enshrine austerity into statute. It remains there. It is yielding slightly, but it keeps well hidden the key to the giant padlock that guards and seals the public spending treasure chest.
Town halls are at least to now be allowed to spend some of the vast surpluses they have been attaining because of the law on financial stability. But they are still subject to spending restrictions on personnel. As can be observed in Capdepera and Muro, which are not the only examples, town halls are severely restricted in terms of police recruitment and police pay. The municipal security force is only one component of the constraint.
So, coincidental with this major increase in tourist numbers has been a block on the wherewithal to deal with them. Policing, or its absence, should have us all alarmed. But the strains are clear elsewhere: cleaning, water, sewage, health service, traffic. Have public services advanced in line with the five million or so tourists advance? They have not.
Should government, Madrid in particular, shoulder the blame? Partly, it should, but then what other options did Madrid really have? But demanding that ever greater financial resources are made available obscures the real issue. The rate of growth in tourism is unsustainable. An island such as Mallorca cannot deal with it. While infrastructure can be updated, there is only so much that the general environment can absorb. It is true that no one ever places precise figures on the island's load capacities, but intuitively as well as financially, there is broad agreement that there is a finite point. And it may well have been reached.
It is no longer just the environmentalists who argue the case. Divisions of the state recognise it, even the ministry for development. While it keeps a weather eye on Aena with its ambitions for increased flights (and by and large seems prepared to permit them), it has its other duties. It is the development ministry that oversees transport in general, land in general. It can talk to the traffic directorate or to the Bank of Spain. The opinions are the same. Not sustainable.
Given this general agreement, there is a need for different branches of government (and business and environmentalists) to come together. But the regional and national governments, thanks to political differences, butt heads rather than make accords. Mallorca, hamstrung by austerity and a disadvantageous financing system, is entitled to expect something more in return for all the wealth that the additional five million is generating. But I say again, financing isn't the real issue.
The regional government, via its legislation, is seeking to spread the load of tourism. It is looking to the island's interior to take some of the strain that has been created by the increased numbers. While this can be positive for some towns, it isn't entirely. Selva is one place where the infrastructure is creaking. Buger, tiny Buger, has the highest density of tourist places on the island relative to population. It doesn't have the ability to serve them.
The oft-quoted slogan is that Mallorca lives from tourism. It does indeed. But an impression given is of an island slowly dying from its own lifeblood.
Showing posts with label Infrastructure. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Infrastructure. Show all posts
Wednesday, June 07, 2017
Sunday, October 05, 2014
Mallorca And The Mountain Of Gold
A mountain of gold. From a distant land known as Madrid, Cristobel the Fairy Godfather waved his magic wand and a spell was cast that flew over the sea as though it were a burnishing trail left by a mythical airplane borne by the wings of angels. The spell touched the highest peaks of the blessed islands of the Balearics and burst like the most benign and glorious fireworks, gold cascading down the valleys, across the plains and to the waters of sapphires. Mont Oro, for it was he, Cristobel the Gold Mountain of All The Treasures of Hispania, spake unto the entranced peoples of the blessed isles. "You shall all go to the Ball (de Bot). You shall all forever more wear glass slippers rather than flip-flops." And the peoples were most grateful.
Well, in a parallel universe the people and politicians of the Balearics might indeed be grateful, but last week there were hordes of ingrates stomping their feet and demanding more. Cristóbal Montoro, Spain's finance minister, had been doing his annual sums. Some for them, some more for them, a bit less for them, and he plucked numbers out of the air and called them the allocations by regions of the state budget. Overlooking the small matter of an 87% increase in the allocation for the Balearics, far from everyone was happy, the discontent coming about because, regardless of this act of central government generosity, the Balearics will still get less per head of population from the national pot than mostly every other region of Spain.
Cheesed off various politicos and businesspeople might be by the miserly sum of 138.4 million euros, but they might remember that there was a time, not so long ago, when the Balearics did much more nicely thank you from the budget. in 2007, as an example, the allocation was 218 million euros, and if one goes back over the years, it will be discovered that, though the amount fluctuated, the Balearics usually did reasonably well. These budget allocations are for what are essentially strategic investments. The lion's share of the Balearics budget is for airports and ports with agriculture and the environment taking up most of the rest.
More investment could doubtless come in handy, but it has to be taken into account that there are eighteen other regions or communities holding out the begging bowl. One of them, Andalusia, despite it being a hotbed of socialism, regularly benefits from Madrid's largesse. It is a comparatively poor region. It is also big. Another, Catalonia (you might have heard of this region, it has been agitating for more for centuries), is also big. It isn't poor but last year it got clobbered by the Rajoy government. 25% down, something else which added to the Mas attack on the Constitution. In 2015, the budget will be up again, as indeed it will be in Galicia (the home region of Rajoy, oh and of Franco as well).
Politics probably do play a part in the budgets, but in truth these allocations are very small beer when compared with what the regions get through the redistribution of tax revenues. This is the principal source of the regions' finances, and it is something for which the Balearics have a very legitimate gripe. The people of the Balearics get back from Madrid around 300 million euros less than they put in.
Well, in a parallel universe the people and politicians of the Balearics might indeed be grateful, but last week there were hordes of ingrates stomping their feet and demanding more. Cristóbal Montoro, Spain's finance minister, had been doing his annual sums. Some for them, some more for them, a bit less for them, and he plucked numbers out of the air and called them the allocations by regions of the state budget. Overlooking the small matter of an 87% increase in the allocation for the Balearics, far from everyone was happy, the discontent coming about because, regardless of this act of central government generosity, the Balearics will still get less per head of population from the national pot than mostly every other region of Spain.
Cheesed off various politicos and businesspeople might be by the miserly sum of 138.4 million euros, but they might remember that there was a time, not so long ago, when the Balearics did much more nicely thank you from the budget. in 2007, as an example, the allocation was 218 million euros, and if one goes back over the years, it will be discovered that, though the amount fluctuated, the Balearics usually did reasonably well. These budget allocations are for what are essentially strategic investments. The lion's share of the Balearics budget is for airports and ports with agriculture and the environment taking up most of the rest.
More investment could doubtless come in handy, but it has to be taken into account that there are eighteen other regions or communities holding out the begging bowl. One of them, Andalusia, despite it being a hotbed of socialism, regularly benefits from Madrid's largesse. It is a comparatively poor region. It is also big. Another, Catalonia (you might have heard of this region, it has been agitating for more for centuries), is also big. It isn't poor but last year it got clobbered by the Rajoy government. 25% down, something else which added to the Mas attack on the Constitution. In 2015, the budget will be up again, as indeed it will be in Galicia (the home region of Rajoy, oh and of Franco as well).
Politics probably do play a part in the budgets, but in truth these allocations are very small beer when compared with what the regions get through the redistribution of tax revenues. This is the principal source of the regions' finances, and it is something for which the Balearics have a very legitimate gripe. The people of the Balearics get back from Madrid around 300 million euros less than they put in.
Saturday, November 30, 2013
Pouring Cold Water on Mallorca's Tourism Growth
Currently, Mallorca receives in the region of nine million tourists a year, over half of them pressed into a period of around fourteen weeks in summer. Such a concentration of humanity leads to the August peaks of total population of the island (residents, tourists and transient workers) when there are, not untypically, 60% more people than in December. In 2012, for instance, on 4 August there were 1,350,000 people as opposed to 843,000 on 23 December. Were the island to in fact receive 100 million tourists over this seven-year period, this would correspond to an increase of just under 60% of what it would receive based on current figures. It would be an enormous increase - 5.3 million more tourists per annum.
On the face of it, if this 100 million were to in fact be a realistic and achievable number, then the island's tourism future would indeed be very rosy. But how achievable would it be? Allowing for the taking-up of hotel occupancy slack, especially in the lower months of the summer, the capacity wouldn't be there. Even if there were the capacity, it doesn't follow that tourists would come in the great numbers that would be needed to make up for what, based on current levels, would be a missing 37 million tourists over seven years.
What might make a difference would be a relaxation of rules on private holiday accommodation (something that would be most unlikely) and something of a construction boom (also unlikely). While there are new hotel projects in the offing, these would not amount to anything like the number of places that would be required.
One has to conclude, therefore, that the report was, at best, an exaggeration. At worst, it was just plain wrong and complete rubbish. Moreover, behind the glowing headline of 100 million tourists was the absence of some pretty obvious questions. Would Mallorca actually want so many tourists and would there be the infrastructure, not just in terms of accommodation, to allow for so many tourists?
Santa Margalida is a town with one of Mallorca's leading tourist resorts, Can Picafort. At present, the town's regular population is no more than 12,000 people. In summer, this can double, thanks to tourists who are primarily accommodated in Can Picafort. There is a limit at the moment on tourist places in the municipality. The maximum is 13,000.
Under an old urban ordinance, the total number of people that Santa Margalida could ultimately accommodate was set at 50,000. This was a figure arrived at years ago and one that did of course envisage significantly more development than has actually occurred. The town hall has now revised this number down to 34,000, but this 34,000 is a limit which does not foresee any meaningful expansion of regulated tourist accommodation, i.e. hotels. It is a theoretical figure which sets a limit on urban development of a residential nature, one that would see the resident population almost doubling but one that is not about to be attained in the foreseeable future.
Town halls do, in theory and usually in practice, have the final say on urban planning matters. The Balearic Government attempted to shift the goalposts on this where tourism accommodation was concerned but was forced to back down in the face of opposition from the town halls and the Council of Mallorca. The town halls do also have responsibility for certain vital services, such as water supplies. And it is these services, as much as anything else, which have to make projections of such a massive increase in tourism numbers highly questionable. If Santa Margalida is indicative of other towns, then it will not be attained.
Such an increase does, though, raise a question which is difficult to answer. Difficult but not impossible. And that is what might be the maximum number of people that Mallorca could support at any one moment in time? Water supplies are one part of the equation. There are others - airport capacity, roads, medical services, emergency and security services, power as well environmental impact. It would not be impossible to create computer models which might give an indication, but, and setting aside possible impacts of climate change, water supplies would be the most important factor.
In this regard, German research published in the journal "Land Use Policy"** highlights the harmful nature of a Mallorcan drive towards ever more "quality" tourism and so the use of water for domestic consumption, pools, golf courses etc. in what are often non-tourism areas of the island. This research echoes the so-called "Benidorm effect", the one by which high concentrations of tourists in limited areas are vastly more efficient in terms of managing resources than a sprawl of tourism. But as can be seen from what Santa Margalida are doing, there is no desire or intention to make its tourism denser.
100 million tourists might sound like good news, but could such a level of tourism be sustained? Where water is concerned, almost certainly not.
** Hof and Schmitt, "Urban and tourist land use patterns and water consumption: Evidence from Mallorca, Balearic Islands", "Land Use Policy", 2011.
http://xesc.cat/ET2050_library/docs/med/water_mallorca.pdf
Index for November 2013
Aznar's memoirs and the Madrid bombs - 3 November 2013
Balearics regional election and party leadership - 16 November 2013
Bank financing of tourist resort renewal - 4 November 2013
Catalan or Mallorquín - 18 November 2013
Doctor Who in Spain - 20 November 2013
Golf tourism - 14 November 2013
I Need Spain slogan - 19 November 2013
IB3 and its costs - 12 November 2013
Illegal rural property - 10 November 2013
Illesbalears.es - 21 November 2013
Innovation and Mallorcan culture - 27 November 2013
Mallorcan place names' ancient origins - 29 November 2013
Millennials and tourism - 15 November 2013
Muro pumpkin autumn fair - 1 November 2013
Olive oil dispensers - 24 November 2013
Palacio de Congresos - 13 November 2013
Poster designs: Pollensa and Muro fairs - 9 November 2013
President Bauzá interview on La Sexta - 26 November 2013
PSOE and national leadership - 11 November 2013
Sa Pobla Japanese tourism - 23 November 2013
Second casino and PP fallout - 25 November 2013
Smart all-inclusive resorts of the future - 2 November 2013
Solar energy law - 8 November 2013
Tourism growth in Mallorca and water resources - 30 November 2013
Tubular Bells, The Exorcist and Mallorca - 28 November 2013
Turespaña director-general - 5 November 2013
Unsold properties - 6 November 2013
Weather in November in Mallorca - 17 November 2013
Winter tourism products - 7 November 2013
Tuesday, July 17, 2012
The Experiment That Went Wrong?
Catalonia has 699 kilometres of coast and each kilometre supports 18,268 tourists. The Balearics have 1,428 kilometres of coast and each kilometre supports 6,329 tourists. Great. On this basis the Balearics could accommodate three times as many tourists and still have loads of coast left over to take on many more. This is one way of looking at the statistics and is almost certainly not the right way of looking at them. Another way of looking at them is that Catalonia is tourism-sardine land and that the Balearics are mercifully not.
Ivan Murray, professor of geography at the Universitat de les Illes Balears and someone to whom I have referred several times previously, once described the mass of tourists who descend on the Balearics as "an aberration without parallel in the whole world". It might appear that he should have been talking about greater aberrations in Catalonia (and Valencia and Andalucía come to that) but there are distinct differences between the Balearics and Catalonia. The islands do not have anything like the land mass of Catalonia, they do not have equivalent centres of population to Catalonia and as islands they have a more fragile ecology than a region of the mainland. A more meaningful comparison might be that between the Balearics and the Canaries, which support 5,182 tourists for each of their 1,583 kilometres of coast.
The national environment ministry has released findings of a study of tourism numbers relative to Spanish regions with coastlines. The Balearics rank fourth in terms of this human pressure after Catalonia, Valencia and Andalucía, each with less coast than the Balearics. Tempting it might be to conclude that scope exists for the expansion of coastal tourism in the Balearics, but such a conclusion would also overlook differences in what generate tourism numbers in the different regions. There may be more theoretical human pressure on the coasts but the tourism numbers elsewhere are engaged in more diverse activities. Andalucía, for example, has its grand cities. It also has ski tourism in the Sierra Nevada. Balearics tourism, while not exclusively coastal tourism, does not have this diversity. The islands' tourism is overwhelmingly coastal and it is tourism that has threatened the islands' coasts with being overwhelmed.
Professor Murray makes the point that this tourism brings with it not only people but also infrastructure which has to support them. And a great deal of it is also coastal; marinas for example. The infrastructure does of course sprawl across whole islands, and Murray makes the further point that this is an infrastructure which has been designed partly if not mainly with tourism in mind.
I have previously spoken about the absurdity of the amount of real estate on Mallorca which lies unused and unproductive for several months of the year. Other investment, that in infrastructure, isn't unused but it has been designed and is being designed for a capacity of people who just aren't around for most of the year. The cost of the investment and of its maintenance contributes to a high cost of living but without the benefits of a genuine return for more than five or six months of the year (fewer, some might say).
The consequence of this is the total disequilibrium which exists in Mallorca's economy. When we consider the mess that the island and the country are in (and though the same disequilibrium exists elsewhere it is not as pronounced as it is in the Balearics), one can argue that tourism is both a solution and a problem. Indeed, to what extent has the financing of infrastructure and construction which guarantees a good return for only a limited period of the year contributed to the financial difficulties?
This infrastructure and construction has been primarily with one aim in mind - coastal development. And coastal development means tourism. The Balearics may have more coast than the likes of Catalonia but how much more coastal development can it take? The reform of the Coasts Law combined with the Balearics new tourism law suggests that there may well be more development. Environmentally it almost certainly makes no sense but economically it is also questionable. More development would not address the disequilibrium. By its very nature, coastal development serves one key purpose - to satisfy tourism for only part of the year.
Murray has described development in the Balearics as a testing ground, an experiment, one used to transfer the experience of tourism to other lands and to make what he calls "non-places". We certainly can't live without tourism in Mallorca and the Balearics, and it cannot be denied that tourism has brought enormous benefits. But have we, without really knowing it, experienced a tipping-point, one at which the experiment actually went wrong?
Any comments to andrew@thealcudiaguide.com please.
Ivan Murray, professor of geography at the Universitat de les Illes Balears and someone to whom I have referred several times previously, once described the mass of tourists who descend on the Balearics as "an aberration without parallel in the whole world". It might appear that he should have been talking about greater aberrations in Catalonia (and Valencia and Andalucía come to that) but there are distinct differences between the Balearics and Catalonia. The islands do not have anything like the land mass of Catalonia, they do not have equivalent centres of population to Catalonia and as islands they have a more fragile ecology than a region of the mainland. A more meaningful comparison might be that between the Balearics and the Canaries, which support 5,182 tourists for each of their 1,583 kilometres of coast.
The national environment ministry has released findings of a study of tourism numbers relative to Spanish regions with coastlines. The Balearics rank fourth in terms of this human pressure after Catalonia, Valencia and Andalucía, each with less coast than the Balearics. Tempting it might be to conclude that scope exists for the expansion of coastal tourism in the Balearics, but such a conclusion would also overlook differences in what generate tourism numbers in the different regions. There may be more theoretical human pressure on the coasts but the tourism numbers elsewhere are engaged in more diverse activities. Andalucía, for example, has its grand cities. It also has ski tourism in the Sierra Nevada. Balearics tourism, while not exclusively coastal tourism, does not have this diversity. The islands' tourism is overwhelmingly coastal and it is tourism that has threatened the islands' coasts with being overwhelmed.
Professor Murray makes the point that this tourism brings with it not only people but also infrastructure which has to support them. And a great deal of it is also coastal; marinas for example. The infrastructure does of course sprawl across whole islands, and Murray makes the further point that this is an infrastructure which has been designed partly if not mainly with tourism in mind.
I have previously spoken about the absurdity of the amount of real estate on Mallorca which lies unused and unproductive for several months of the year. Other investment, that in infrastructure, isn't unused but it has been designed and is being designed for a capacity of people who just aren't around for most of the year. The cost of the investment and of its maintenance contributes to a high cost of living but without the benefits of a genuine return for more than five or six months of the year (fewer, some might say).
The consequence of this is the total disequilibrium which exists in Mallorca's economy. When we consider the mess that the island and the country are in (and though the same disequilibrium exists elsewhere it is not as pronounced as it is in the Balearics), one can argue that tourism is both a solution and a problem. Indeed, to what extent has the financing of infrastructure and construction which guarantees a good return for only a limited period of the year contributed to the financial difficulties?
This infrastructure and construction has been primarily with one aim in mind - coastal development. And coastal development means tourism. The Balearics may have more coast than the likes of Catalonia but how much more coastal development can it take? The reform of the Coasts Law combined with the Balearics new tourism law suggests that there may well be more development. Environmentally it almost certainly makes no sense but economically it is also questionable. More development would not address the disequilibrium. By its very nature, coastal development serves one key purpose - to satisfy tourism for only part of the year.
Murray has described development in the Balearics as a testing ground, an experiment, one used to transfer the experience of tourism to other lands and to make what he calls "non-places". We certainly can't live without tourism in Mallorca and the Balearics, and it cannot be denied that tourism has brought enormous benefits. But have we, without really knowing it, experienced a tipping-point, one at which the experiment actually went wrong?
Any comments to andrew@thealcudiaguide.com please.
Wednesday, May 09, 2012
Stupid And Crazy: Spain's airports
Following the previous feature about the profitability of Palma's Son Sant Joan, more on airports and this time their lack of profitability.
The national government's minister for development (which covers transport) has announced that there is to be a study of the viability and profitability of the whole of Spain's network of airports. The number of airports that this network comprises varies depending on which report you come across. It fluctuates between 46 and 49. Whatever the actual figure (and let's get round the confusion by saying that there are nearly 50), the fact is that there are way more airports in Spain than in, just as an example, Germany. Way more to the tune of there being twice as many for a population almost half the size.
At the end of the previous article, I concluded by sounding a warning for Menorca. Its airport is heavily in debt and its losses last year were among the highest of any airport in the Spanish network. It would, however, be most unlikely that Menorca would lose its airport, given that it is essential and that it would qualify for being maintained under a criterion of "public benefit", but there are plenty of airports within the network that could well face the axe.
The minister, Ana Pastor, has admitted that any adjustment to or rationalisation of the airport network would be "complicated". The complication is created by an infrastructure of airports which is, in her words, "stupid and crazy". There are far too many airports and far too many that came into being for no particularly good reason.
The growth in the airport network was symptomatic of the construction-led infrastructure boom in Spain which has been partly responsible for the mess the country is now in. While the continuance of older airports, such as Menorca's, despite its loss-making, is fully justifiable, the continuance of some newer ones is much harder to justify. Only ten of the airports in the network make a positive return, and of those which don't there are examples of airports having been built which were as a result of sheer folly. Which brings us to the case of Castellón airport.
This airport, less than an hour away from Valencia's main airport, was built at a cost of 150 million euros. It was opened in March last year. To date, there has not been a single flight. The reasons why not are many, one of them having been the absence of the necessary licence. It is said that Castellón now has an agreement with Jet2 to start flights next year and that negotiations are ongoing with other airlines, but in the meantime, and in addition to the cost of its construction, the runway will have to be re-built as it is too narrow, 30 million euros have apparently been eaten up on advertising the airport and 300,000 euros have been spent on a truly hideous sculpture.
The sculpture tells its own tale. Featured within it is the face of Carlos Fabra, a leading Partido Popular politician and a prime mover behind the airport's construction. Fabra has been implicated, on more than one occasion, in corruption cases.
Castellón is perhaps an extreme example of the profligacy of the development of Spain's airport network. It is an example also, however, of how regional administrations have contributed to Spain's economic plight by embarking on wholly unnecessary projects.
Flavour of the month it is to give the regional governments a good kicking, but a recent and insightful article by a Spanish journalist writing in English for the "El Pais" newspaper's English website argued that the problem lies not with the system of regional government but with the politicians it gives rise to. It is a fair point, but the trouble is that if you give someone a toy then they will play with it, which is precisely what has happened. Hence the pointless, expensive and sometimes unused infrastructure projects that proliferate across Spain, of which regional airports are a case in point.
When the development minister speaks of "stupid and crazy" infrastructure, she could as easily be referring to projects other than just airports. Mallorca has its own examples, the current building of the Palacio de Congresos in Palma being one. The impression has been given that the only reason for it coming into existence is because other Spanish cities have got similar convention centres; an exercise in me-too in other words.
Me-too has been the real impulse behind all the airports, and of the new ones, none are profitable. Stupid and crazy? Discuss.
Any comments to andrew@thealcudiaguide.com please.
The national government's minister for development (which covers transport) has announced that there is to be a study of the viability and profitability of the whole of Spain's network of airports. The number of airports that this network comprises varies depending on which report you come across. It fluctuates between 46 and 49. Whatever the actual figure (and let's get round the confusion by saying that there are nearly 50), the fact is that there are way more airports in Spain than in, just as an example, Germany. Way more to the tune of there being twice as many for a population almost half the size.
At the end of the previous article, I concluded by sounding a warning for Menorca. Its airport is heavily in debt and its losses last year were among the highest of any airport in the Spanish network. It would, however, be most unlikely that Menorca would lose its airport, given that it is essential and that it would qualify for being maintained under a criterion of "public benefit", but there are plenty of airports within the network that could well face the axe.
The minister, Ana Pastor, has admitted that any adjustment to or rationalisation of the airport network would be "complicated". The complication is created by an infrastructure of airports which is, in her words, "stupid and crazy". There are far too many airports and far too many that came into being for no particularly good reason.
The growth in the airport network was symptomatic of the construction-led infrastructure boom in Spain which has been partly responsible for the mess the country is now in. While the continuance of older airports, such as Menorca's, despite its loss-making, is fully justifiable, the continuance of some newer ones is much harder to justify. Only ten of the airports in the network make a positive return, and of those which don't there are examples of airports having been built which were as a result of sheer folly. Which brings us to the case of Castellón airport.
This airport, less than an hour away from Valencia's main airport, was built at a cost of 150 million euros. It was opened in March last year. To date, there has not been a single flight. The reasons why not are many, one of them having been the absence of the necessary licence. It is said that Castellón now has an agreement with Jet2 to start flights next year and that negotiations are ongoing with other airlines, but in the meantime, and in addition to the cost of its construction, the runway will have to be re-built as it is too narrow, 30 million euros have apparently been eaten up on advertising the airport and 300,000 euros have been spent on a truly hideous sculpture.
The sculpture tells its own tale. Featured within it is the face of Carlos Fabra, a leading Partido Popular politician and a prime mover behind the airport's construction. Fabra has been implicated, on more than one occasion, in corruption cases.
Castellón is perhaps an extreme example of the profligacy of the development of Spain's airport network. It is an example also, however, of how regional administrations have contributed to Spain's economic plight by embarking on wholly unnecessary projects.
Flavour of the month it is to give the regional governments a good kicking, but a recent and insightful article by a Spanish journalist writing in English for the "El Pais" newspaper's English website argued that the problem lies not with the system of regional government but with the politicians it gives rise to. It is a fair point, but the trouble is that if you give someone a toy then they will play with it, which is precisely what has happened. Hence the pointless, expensive and sometimes unused infrastructure projects that proliferate across Spain, of which regional airports are a case in point.
When the development minister speaks of "stupid and crazy" infrastructure, she could as easily be referring to projects other than just airports. Mallorca has its own examples, the current building of the Palacio de Congresos in Palma being one. The impression has been given that the only reason for it coming into existence is because other Spanish cities have got similar convention centres; an exercise in me-too in other words.
Me-too has been the real impulse behind all the airports, and of the new ones, none are profitable. Stupid and crazy? Discuss.
Any comments to andrew@thealcudiaguide.com please.
Monday, February 20, 2012
Electric Light Orchestra: Mallorca's electricity
Endesa's recent announcement that cold weather had brought about record gas consumption levels in Mallorca was hardly a great surprise. Not because of the cold weather as such, but because natural gas has been supplied to the island for only two and a half years.
Infrastructure can take an awfully long time to be developed. The introduction of natural gas does give rise to the promise that the days of hernias and back problems, thanks to humping butane bottles around, might soon be something of the past. Natural gas is on its way north and west from its Palma base - to Inca and then onwards to Alcúdia and also to Andratx.
The piecemeal approach to the development of a gas infrastructure has echoes of that which brought electricity to Mallorca. There was little danger of there ever having been any light pollution in Mallorca before the turn of the last century, and for some time afterwards the danger only slowly became a possibility.
Electricity arrived on the island, not as you might have expected in Palma, but, of all places, in Alaró. 1901 was the year that the first electricity network was established, thanks to the vision of one Gaspar Perelló, native of Alaró, who had been to Barcelona and realised what vision could really be, thanks to the city's electricity system.
From the first bulbs being lit at the town's Mare de Déu d'Agost fiesta in 1901, it was still several years before other towns started to catch on to the idea. In 1912 Sa Pobla got its first real spark of electrification. The hundredth anniversary of lighting up La Puebla will be on 24 July, coinciding with the Sant Jaume fiesta, and doubtless there will be a display of lighting that befits the occasion and probably results in an overload of the system and power cuts for everyone else.
We can expect a 1912 overture with full orchestral accompaniment in a Sa Pobla piper and whistler style, and there will be further ones over the next years until 2026, the one-hundredth anniversary of the lights truly going on all over Mallorca. But all that sound and light in Sa Pobla will probably be as nothing compared with another electrifying one-hundredth birthday, as the grand switch-on in Sa Pobla was overshadowed, three months earlier, by a fanfare for the common man not on the Clapham omnibus but on the Sóller train. 6 April 1912 was when it was inaugurated, though to be electrically correct, it was to be another 17 years before an electric train ran.
A mere one hundred years later, the electrification of the Palma to Inca railway has now been celebrated, but how long it might be before the extension to Sa Pobla gets its juices flowing, who can tell? He who holds the keys to the 45 million or so that will be required to do so, along with the extension to Manacor; that's who.
With all these electric jubilees knocking around, it is unfortunate that a hundred years of electricity have to coincide with grand switchings-off rather than switchings-on. And in an effort to help with household energy bills, the regional government has hit upon the idea of having meters show consumption directly as euros, instead of kilowatts per hour, something that no one understands, rather like an Endesa bill therefore.
The story of Mallorca's electricity and indeed its trains at the start of the last century was one of lack of interest by government and a reluctance to invest in mostly any form of infrastructure. The story has changed in Spain as a whole, but in Mallorca the story is different to that of the mainland. Álvaro Middelmann, the director of Air Berlin in Spain and Portugal, has said that Mallorca and the Balearics should be compensated because of the islands' transport systems. The citizens of the islands pay the same taxes but they don't get the same benefits of motorway systems or high-speed trains.
Cost of energy is another disadvantage that the islands have. Investment there may have been in natural gas and also in electricity cabling from the mainland, but infrastructure is still lacking by comparison with the mainland. Part of the rail network has been electrified but it is inadequate and subject to political squabbles and funding cuts, as have affected extensions to Alcúdia and Artà.
Still, at least there is some public money. This didn't used to be the case. Alaró's electricity, Sa Pobla's electricity, the Sóller railway; they were all private initiatives. And in the case of the Sóller railway, it still is.
Any comments to andrew@thealcudiaguide.com please.
Infrastructure can take an awfully long time to be developed. The introduction of natural gas does give rise to the promise that the days of hernias and back problems, thanks to humping butane bottles around, might soon be something of the past. Natural gas is on its way north and west from its Palma base - to Inca and then onwards to Alcúdia and also to Andratx.
The piecemeal approach to the development of a gas infrastructure has echoes of that which brought electricity to Mallorca. There was little danger of there ever having been any light pollution in Mallorca before the turn of the last century, and for some time afterwards the danger only slowly became a possibility.
Electricity arrived on the island, not as you might have expected in Palma, but, of all places, in Alaró. 1901 was the year that the first electricity network was established, thanks to the vision of one Gaspar Perelló, native of Alaró, who had been to Barcelona and realised what vision could really be, thanks to the city's electricity system.
From the first bulbs being lit at the town's Mare de Déu d'Agost fiesta in 1901, it was still several years before other towns started to catch on to the idea. In 1912 Sa Pobla got its first real spark of electrification. The hundredth anniversary of lighting up La Puebla will be on 24 July, coinciding with the Sant Jaume fiesta, and doubtless there will be a display of lighting that befits the occasion and probably results in an overload of the system and power cuts for everyone else.
We can expect a 1912 overture with full orchestral accompaniment in a Sa Pobla piper and whistler style, and there will be further ones over the next years until 2026, the one-hundredth anniversary of the lights truly going on all over Mallorca. But all that sound and light in Sa Pobla will probably be as nothing compared with another electrifying one-hundredth birthday, as the grand switch-on in Sa Pobla was overshadowed, three months earlier, by a fanfare for the common man not on the Clapham omnibus but on the Sóller train. 6 April 1912 was when it was inaugurated, though to be electrically correct, it was to be another 17 years before an electric train ran.
A mere one hundred years later, the electrification of the Palma to Inca railway has now been celebrated, but how long it might be before the extension to Sa Pobla gets its juices flowing, who can tell? He who holds the keys to the 45 million or so that will be required to do so, along with the extension to Manacor; that's who.
With all these electric jubilees knocking around, it is unfortunate that a hundred years of electricity have to coincide with grand switchings-off rather than switchings-on. And in an effort to help with household energy bills, the regional government has hit upon the idea of having meters show consumption directly as euros, instead of kilowatts per hour, something that no one understands, rather like an Endesa bill therefore.
The story of Mallorca's electricity and indeed its trains at the start of the last century was one of lack of interest by government and a reluctance to invest in mostly any form of infrastructure. The story has changed in Spain as a whole, but in Mallorca the story is different to that of the mainland. Álvaro Middelmann, the director of Air Berlin in Spain and Portugal, has said that Mallorca and the Balearics should be compensated because of the islands' transport systems. The citizens of the islands pay the same taxes but they don't get the same benefits of motorway systems or high-speed trains.
Cost of energy is another disadvantage that the islands have. Investment there may have been in natural gas and also in electricity cabling from the mainland, but infrastructure is still lacking by comparison with the mainland. Part of the rail network has been electrified but it is inadequate and subject to political squabbles and funding cuts, as have affected extensions to Alcúdia and Artà.
Still, at least there is some public money. This didn't used to be the case. Alaró's electricity, Sa Pobla's electricity, the Sóller railway; they were all private initiatives. And in the case of the Sóller railway, it still is.
Any comments to andrew@thealcudiaguide.com please.
Tuesday, March 22, 2011
Underground, Overground, Infrastructure Isn't Free
It is easy to forget just how much Mallorca has developed in a relatively short period of time. The island's "industrial revolution" is not even 50 years old; mass tourism in terms of massive tourism across Mallorca didn't become fact until the '70s. It is unsurprising, perhaps, that the infrastructure to support this revolution has taken time to become a reality.
Gas, natural gas, is the latest infrastructure development. The connection from the mainland came on-stream in late 2009. One of the things holding up the creation of the network is the inevitable process of getting agreement from all parties, not least owners of land who will be affected by the installation of pipes. The first phase of taking the gas into the regions, from Palma to Andratx, has run up against exactly this obstacle.
Objections are not solely being made on grounds of environmental disruption. There is also the safety angle, and the objections seem bizarre, quaint even, for those of us used for years to natural gas in the UK. Local fears are of the unknown, of the new-fangled. Yet, you couldn't get much more old-fangled than what natural gas would ultimately put an end to - butane supply. Natural gas would have an enormous benefit not just because of its convenience; it would mean an end to hernias and pulled back muscles. The "butaneros" of Mallorca may find themselves out of a job, and so may many a chiropractor.
Natural gas would have an additional benefit, that of putting a stop to the butane scams. Two separate actions by the police forces are currently ongoing. For this reason alone, the arrival of natural gas will be a huge bonus, as it will also be if it means not seeing the flames flicker and then go out on the hob and having to go outside in a howling gale and horizontal rain in order to mess around with changing the gas bottle.
The supply of gas has not, as yet, run up against a different obstacle, one facing electricity cabling from the mainland. How exactly does it happen that a town hall, Sagunto in this instance, can suddenly turn round and say that the supplier, Red Eléctrica, does not have permission to occupy land in the mainland municipality and also has to pay a tax in order to continue work on laying the cable to the Balearics? The how probably has something to do with this latter aspect. Some bright spark at the town hall eyes up the opportunity for some extra revenue.
Whatever the infrastructure development, there is some hassle associated with it. A new road, such as the so-called "via conectora" in Palma to take some strain off of the creaking road system around the city, becomes mired in objections. The siting of train lines encounter similar squabbles. Re-development of Playa de Palma, ditto. It makes you wish for the old days when a Franco-esque official would have come along one day, nailed the order for works to commence to the head of a passing peasant and the next day sent in the boys with the shovels.
And back then, whatever was built would have been as cheap as chips. Today? How much might we end up paying for natural gas? Don't bank on it being cheap. Don't bank on it being operated in a fashion that might be competitive and with the consumer first in mind.
Telecommunications are another element of infrastructure which has come on in leaps and bounds. Sort of. Time was, really not so long ago, the start of the '90s, that parts of the island weren't able to moan about Telefonica because they had no lines to moan about. Parts of the island still can't, because phone lines can't be laid across some of it. But where it is, the service is neither inexpensive nor satisfactory. Let me give you a personal example.
For some time there has been a problem with my ADSL. It has finally emerged that I have been paying for three megabytes (only three) which cannot be adequately supplied because of the distance I am from the exchange. I have, in fact, been getting little more than one megabyte. The internet provider, Orange, does at least see my argument, that perhaps I am entitled to some form of recompense.
Regardless of this, internet provision is absurdly expensive. And one also has the honour of forking out for Telefonica's line rental when the phone itself is barely used. This rental brings you to another sort of rental, that of the "potencia" contract for electricity supply.
Can anyone explain this to me? It seems to have no rhyme nor reason, other than to stuff the coffers of Endesa. It was not something I paid much attention to (I seem to be one of the few people in Mallorca never to have had much of a problem with electricity bills, while my "potencia" is low) until some correspondence I received and some checking with neighbours highlighted the apparent iniquities with this charge, to say nothing of why it is made in the first place.
Yes, Mallorca has developed greatly in a relatively short period of time. Developed in terms of constant objections, expense, uncompetitiveness and the Heath Robinson; current-day utilities don't get much more Heath Robinson than faffing around with a butane bottle. Not yet 50 years of industrial revolution. In another 50, they may just have got round to something like reasonably priced efficiency.
Any comments to andrew@thealcudiaguide.com please.
Gas, natural gas, is the latest infrastructure development. The connection from the mainland came on-stream in late 2009. One of the things holding up the creation of the network is the inevitable process of getting agreement from all parties, not least owners of land who will be affected by the installation of pipes. The first phase of taking the gas into the regions, from Palma to Andratx, has run up against exactly this obstacle.
Objections are not solely being made on grounds of environmental disruption. There is also the safety angle, and the objections seem bizarre, quaint even, for those of us used for years to natural gas in the UK. Local fears are of the unknown, of the new-fangled. Yet, you couldn't get much more old-fangled than what natural gas would ultimately put an end to - butane supply. Natural gas would have an enormous benefit not just because of its convenience; it would mean an end to hernias and pulled back muscles. The "butaneros" of Mallorca may find themselves out of a job, and so may many a chiropractor.
Natural gas would have an additional benefit, that of putting a stop to the butane scams. Two separate actions by the police forces are currently ongoing. For this reason alone, the arrival of natural gas will be a huge bonus, as it will also be if it means not seeing the flames flicker and then go out on the hob and having to go outside in a howling gale and horizontal rain in order to mess around with changing the gas bottle.
The supply of gas has not, as yet, run up against a different obstacle, one facing electricity cabling from the mainland. How exactly does it happen that a town hall, Sagunto in this instance, can suddenly turn round and say that the supplier, Red Eléctrica, does not have permission to occupy land in the mainland municipality and also has to pay a tax in order to continue work on laying the cable to the Balearics? The how probably has something to do with this latter aspect. Some bright spark at the town hall eyes up the opportunity for some extra revenue.
Whatever the infrastructure development, there is some hassle associated with it. A new road, such as the so-called "via conectora" in Palma to take some strain off of the creaking road system around the city, becomes mired in objections. The siting of train lines encounter similar squabbles. Re-development of Playa de Palma, ditto. It makes you wish for the old days when a Franco-esque official would have come along one day, nailed the order for works to commence to the head of a passing peasant and the next day sent in the boys with the shovels.
And back then, whatever was built would have been as cheap as chips. Today? How much might we end up paying for natural gas? Don't bank on it being cheap. Don't bank on it being operated in a fashion that might be competitive and with the consumer first in mind.
Telecommunications are another element of infrastructure which has come on in leaps and bounds. Sort of. Time was, really not so long ago, the start of the '90s, that parts of the island weren't able to moan about Telefonica because they had no lines to moan about. Parts of the island still can't, because phone lines can't be laid across some of it. But where it is, the service is neither inexpensive nor satisfactory. Let me give you a personal example.
For some time there has been a problem with my ADSL. It has finally emerged that I have been paying for three megabytes (only three) which cannot be adequately supplied because of the distance I am from the exchange. I have, in fact, been getting little more than one megabyte. The internet provider, Orange, does at least see my argument, that perhaps I am entitled to some form of recompense.
Regardless of this, internet provision is absurdly expensive. And one also has the honour of forking out for Telefonica's line rental when the phone itself is barely used. This rental brings you to another sort of rental, that of the "potencia" contract for electricity supply.
Can anyone explain this to me? It seems to have no rhyme nor reason, other than to stuff the coffers of Endesa. It was not something I paid much attention to (I seem to be one of the few people in Mallorca never to have had much of a problem with electricity bills, while my "potencia" is low) until some correspondence I received and some checking with neighbours highlighted the apparent iniquities with this charge, to say nothing of why it is made in the first place.
Yes, Mallorca has developed greatly in a relatively short period of time. Developed in terms of constant objections, expense, uncompetitiveness and the Heath Robinson; current-day utilities don't get much more Heath Robinson than faffing around with a butane bottle. Not yet 50 years of industrial revolution. In another 50, they may just have got round to something like reasonably priced efficiency.
Any comments to andrew@thealcudiaguide.com please.
Wednesday, December 19, 2007
Everyday People
The population of the Balearics rose by some three per cent last year. In total, the population stood – as of 1 January this year – at 1,030,650, much of the increase being down to immigration, with the Germans and the British leading the way in terms of the numbers of foreigners resident on the islands. The increase translates as a net gain of some 80 people per day.
How sustainable would such an annual increase be? It is a matter that taxes the politicians, not least the Unió Mallorquina (the Mallorcan national party) which believes that there is only so much of Mallorca to go round, even if this perfectly legitimate stance may be influenced by a touch of xenophobia (though they would doubtless deny that).
A report earlier this year suggested a drop in the level of foreign property purchasing. Though this perhaps conflicts with the actual population growth, Mallorca remains an attractive target, and new markets keep emerging, as with the Russians. It is the overseas purchaser who, in part, helps to keep property prices high, and it is the overseas purchaser who is important at a time when the credit squeeze has hit in Spain.
Yet there is a point at which even Mallorca’s improved infrastructure will begin to creak. I mentioned a while ago that Mallorca is roughly equivalent in size to Essex, but its population is less than two-thirds of the county, nearly a half of it in Palma. Plenty of space you might think, except Mallorca has mountains that do not readily lend themselves to vast urbanisations. Over 40% of Spain’s whole population lives by the coast; in Mallorca it is more like 70%, probably higher. Despite the environmental worry (and the threat to coastal areas is a similar issue in Essex, perhaps more so because of the Thames flood plain), there is no sign of a reverse in residential-construction policy that would inhabit the interior to a far greater extent. Indeed, one of the current political footballs is the extent to which rural areas might be built on or not (to which I have referred before).
Much as I might find displeasure in the new architecture of a small urban area such as Puerto Pollensa (or at least the context of that architecture), there is of course sense in exploiting this area rather than the “green belt”. But there again, a town like Puerto Pollensa can only itself take so much. Yet, like the UK and therefore no doubt Essex, there is a not insignificant amount of housing stock that is under-utilised. How many of those new apartments in the “Pollentia” development, I wonder, will be lived in all year? Take a walk around my area in Playa de Muro, and perhaps as much as a third of the dwellings are unoccupied at this time of the year.
The population growth is a sign of the attractiveness of Mallorca (and the Balearics) as a place of residence; the growth is thus a potential negative of the island’s success. Housing is by no means the only issue related to population growth, but if it really is such an issue (and there must be still some doubt as to that), then all new house or apartment purchases should be unequivocally – and legally – either first homes or residential lets: no second, third or however many homes, and no holiday lets. Fine in theory. Wouldn’t work in practice.
QUIZ
Yesterday – Donovan. Today’s title – which American outfit?
(PLEASE REPLY TO andrew@thealcudiaguide.com AND NOT VIA THE COMMENTS THINGY HERE.)
How sustainable would such an annual increase be? It is a matter that taxes the politicians, not least the Unió Mallorquina (the Mallorcan national party) which believes that there is only so much of Mallorca to go round, even if this perfectly legitimate stance may be influenced by a touch of xenophobia (though they would doubtless deny that).
A report earlier this year suggested a drop in the level of foreign property purchasing. Though this perhaps conflicts with the actual population growth, Mallorca remains an attractive target, and new markets keep emerging, as with the Russians. It is the overseas purchaser who, in part, helps to keep property prices high, and it is the overseas purchaser who is important at a time when the credit squeeze has hit in Spain.
Yet there is a point at which even Mallorca’s improved infrastructure will begin to creak. I mentioned a while ago that Mallorca is roughly equivalent in size to Essex, but its population is less than two-thirds of the county, nearly a half of it in Palma. Plenty of space you might think, except Mallorca has mountains that do not readily lend themselves to vast urbanisations. Over 40% of Spain’s whole population lives by the coast; in Mallorca it is more like 70%, probably higher. Despite the environmental worry (and the threat to coastal areas is a similar issue in Essex, perhaps more so because of the Thames flood plain), there is no sign of a reverse in residential-construction policy that would inhabit the interior to a far greater extent. Indeed, one of the current political footballs is the extent to which rural areas might be built on or not (to which I have referred before).
Much as I might find displeasure in the new architecture of a small urban area such as Puerto Pollensa (or at least the context of that architecture), there is of course sense in exploiting this area rather than the “green belt”. But there again, a town like Puerto Pollensa can only itself take so much. Yet, like the UK and therefore no doubt Essex, there is a not insignificant amount of housing stock that is under-utilised. How many of those new apartments in the “Pollentia” development, I wonder, will be lived in all year? Take a walk around my area in Playa de Muro, and perhaps as much as a third of the dwellings are unoccupied at this time of the year.
The population growth is a sign of the attractiveness of Mallorca (and the Balearics) as a place of residence; the growth is thus a potential negative of the island’s success. Housing is by no means the only issue related to population growth, but if it really is such an issue (and there must be still some doubt as to that), then all new house or apartment purchases should be unequivocally – and legally – either first homes or residential lets: no second, third or however many homes, and no holiday lets. Fine in theory. Wouldn’t work in practice.
QUIZ
Yesterday – Donovan. Today’s title – which American outfit?
(PLEASE REPLY TO andrew@thealcudiaguide.com AND NOT VIA THE COMMENTS THINGY HERE.)
Tuesday, November 20, 2007
Rip It Up And Start Again
Something that is overlooked in the whole debate about winter tourism is the level of building that occurs in the off-season. For most of the summer season there is a moratorium on much building work in tourist areas, for which read much of the island. This building - be it of dwellings, offices, public places etc. - occurs mainly in the off-season months, i.e. through the winter. This is building to meet the demand of a growing economy. And then there is other construction and civil engineering that has to take place out of season to upgrade an infrastructure that is still lacking in some respects. Over recent years, the centres of Can Picafort, Puerto Alcúdia and Puerto Pollensa have all been ripped up - in the case of Puerto Pollensa every year, it would seem. The work has been vital in improving the likes of drainage and sewage. More is needed if the money is ever forthcoming to facilitate it - like tackling the shambolic state of some of Puerto Pollensa’s roads.
Were there to be a far greater level of winter tourism, this work would either not go ahead or, more likely, co-exist alongside a tourist influx that would have to lump the fact of building work, something hardly conducive to a positive tourist experience.
Hotels also use the off-season for building. Whilst by no means all hotels are worked on over the winter, there is a good deal that does go on. One might legitimately argue why there needs to be so much work, and I confess it is something that baffles me, unless that is some hotels were not up to standard in the first place. There again, some hotels are quite old, and some must take a hell of a pummelling in summer - just one indication, I have remarked before on the piles of old and new mattresses that are a common sight outside hotels as part of their refurb. I have also remarked on how the likes of Iberostar seem to be engaged in a process of continuous improvement - the guts of the hotels being ripped out and renewed. Moreover, there is a drive to upgrade the general hotel stock. TUI Germany is wanting 4-star facilities as a norm. For TUI Germany, read also TUI UK, in other words Thomson and now also First Choice. TUI is also keen that hotels can boast eco-friendliness as part of its marketing, whatever that means, though presumably it would require at least some alteration work. Add to this, there is the fact that some hotels may well face the need to do some reconstruction under the coast-regeneration initiative; some terraces and pools would have to be demolished and re-sited.
One hears talk of how things used to be, of glory days when apparently the streets of Mallorca were thronged with winter tourists. Yes, there was a time when there more, a time before the competition of other destinations got in the way. Again it might be argued though that these greater numbers were catered for adequately enough. But perhaps that was a time when the tourist was a less discerning consumer, a time also when tour operators and indeed politicians were less discerning. For the time being, tectonics and tarmac dominate winter, and not the tourist.
QUIZ
Yesterday - The Beatles, “Back In The USSR”. Today’s title - song by a Scottish group.
(PLEASE REPLY TO andrew@thealcudiaguide.com AND NOT VIA THE COMMENTS THINGY HERE.)
Were there to be a far greater level of winter tourism, this work would either not go ahead or, more likely, co-exist alongside a tourist influx that would have to lump the fact of building work, something hardly conducive to a positive tourist experience.
Hotels also use the off-season for building. Whilst by no means all hotels are worked on over the winter, there is a good deal that does go on. One might legitimately argue why there needs to be so much work, and I confess it is something that baffles me, unless that is some hotels were not up to standard in the first place. There again, some hotels are quite old, and some must take a hell of a pummelling in summer - just one indication, I have remarked before on the piles of old and new mattresses that are a common sight outside hotels as part of their refurb. I have also remarked on how the likes of Iberostar seem to be engaged in a process of continuous improvement - the guts of the hotels being ripped out and renewed. Moreover, there is a drive to upgrade the general hotel stock. TUI Germany is wanting 4-star facilities as a norm. For TUI Germany, read also TUI UK, in other words Thomson and now also First Choice. TUI is also keen that hotels can boast eco-friendliness as part of its marketing, whatever that means, though presumably it would require at least some alteration work. Add to this, there is the fact that some hotels may well face the need to do some reconstruction under the coast-regeneration initiative; some terraces and pools would have to be demolished and re-sited.
One hears talk of how things used to be, of glory days when apparently the streets of Mallorca were thronged with winter tourists. Yes, there was a time when there more, a time before the competition of other destinations got in the way. Again it might be argued though that these greater numbers were catered for adequately enough. But perhaps that was a time when the tourist was a less discerning consumer, a time also when tour operators and indeed politicians were less discerning. For the time being, tectonics and tarmac dominate winter, and not the tourist.
QUIZ
Yesterday - The Beatles, “Back In The USSR”. Today’s title - song by a Scottish group.
(PLEASE REPLY TO andrew@thealcudiaguide.com AND NOT VIA THE COMMENTS THINGY HERE.)
Tuesday, September 18, 2007
In The Year ...
This year has been slightly better than last year, according to the Mallorcan hotel federation. So, rejoicing all round. Perhaps. But if 2006 and 2007 have been “record years”, it could be you ain’t seen nothing yet. Miguel Hernández Magán is an expert in the hospitality industry. In today’s “Diario de Mallorca” he is quoted as saying that by 2020 the number of tourists to the Balearics will have doubled, which, on the face of it, sounds like good news. The problems would lie though in the infrastructure, specifically the transport system and most obviously - in the case of all of the islands - the respective airports. Over and above that, however, would be issues related to, among others, water. This is already a problem in, for example, Puerto Pollensa.
Hernández is a representative of a group that looks at the sustainability and quality of tourism, this group having adopted the concept of “holidays for all”, which would mean people from all parts of the European Union, and - he believes - an end to the inconvenience of the current seasonality of tourism. This, in turn, would help relieve the congestion reported a bit over a month ago (11 August: Never Far From The Madding Crowd). But would it really put an end to this? I find it hard to believe. Were it not to, then to accommodate (literally) this doubling of the tourist population would require a significant increase in hotel stock. Given that places like Alcúdia and Can Picafort are already “hotelled-out” (if one can use such an expression), it could be that other as yet undeveloped centres would become so. Son Serra de Marina, anyone?
QUIZ
Yesterday - U2. Today. Continue the title and you get 2525. Could have been Prince’s 2020 or some reference to England’s useless cricket team. But no, it’s Zager and Evans. And here’s the question. What prophesy in that song has already been realised?
(PLEASE REPLY TO andrew@thealcudiaguide.com AND NOT VIA THE COMMENTS THINGY HERE.)
Hernández is a representative of a group that looks at the sustainability and quality of tourism, this group having adopted the concept of “holidays for all”, which would mean people from all parts of the European Union, and - he believes - an end to the inconvenience of the current seasonality of tourism. This, in turn, would help relieve the congestion reported a bit over a month ago (11 August: Never Far From The Madding Crowd). But would it really put an end to this? I find it hard to believe. Were it not to, then to accommodate (literally) this doubling of the tourist population would require a significant increase in hotel stock. Given that places like Alcúdia and Can Picafort are already “hotelled-out” (if one can use such an expression), it could be that other as yet undeveloped centres would become so. Son Serra de Marina, anyone?
QUIZ
Yesterday - U2. Today. Continue the title and you get 2525. Could have been Prince’s 2020 or some reference to England’s useless cricket team. But no, it’s Zager and Evans. And here’s the question. What prophesy in that song has already been realised?
(PLEASE REPLY TO andrew@thealcudiaguide.com AND NOT VIA THE COMMENTS THINGY HERE.)
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