The new building ruins on the Iberian south-east coast is a shame in the nature reserve. But some see it as a missed economic opportunity.
The Hotel Algarrobico near Carboneras in Almeria.
«The Hotel Algarrobico! You should have finished building it. It was almost done. It would have brought jobs. Now we have a new building in ruins and no jobs, »says a late round in a bar in the coastal town of Carboneras on the south-eastern corner of Spain. The people here don’t care that the hotel is in a nature reserve Cabo de Gata stands, also in the general building ban zone along the coast. Economy comes before environment or beauty and also before law.
The Phantom Hotel Algarrobico is Spain’s most famous new building ruin, a failed oriental dream with battlements and towers. The hotel is regarded as a symbol of the unleashed building frenzy of the beginning of the century, of “everything goes” in the legal vacuum of speculation.
The hotel was financed and built by the real estate group Azata del Sol. As early as 1998, the competent authority in Madrid had stated that there was a ban on construction at this point. Nevertheless, in 2003 the excavators arrived. A building freeze was ordered for the first time in 2005, but this was contested. Construction continued at a rapid pace. Apparently, they wanted to create a fait accompli, even with the threat of high claims for compensation. In 2006, construction was definitely stopped.
The real estate group demands one from the municipality of Carboneras and from the Andalusia region Damage payment of 70 million euros for his bad investment and for the damage to his image. He claims that he had a valid building permit. However, previous claims for compensation were rejected by the courts. The company has since been split into three parts, making the legal process more complicated.
Loose cranes, loose law
Three dilapidated cranes are still there, wire ropes hanging from the outriggers and dangling in the stormy wind. Sprayers left pictures and signs. Greens sprout from cracks in the concrete. Nobody is to be seen.
The monster should have been demolished long ago. But building illegally is quick, demolishing legally takes time. The Supreme Court ordered the demolition, but a regional administrative court ruled against it. The building permit of the community must be formally withdrawn, only then can the demolition begin, it was said to justify. According to the judgment of the Supreme Court, the building permit was illegal from the start.
“Blow it up!” some demand. The architect Alejandro del Castillo Sanchez, a specialist in the disposal of superfluous buildings, is on the contrary in favor of gentle demolition. You have to dismantle the hotel piece by piece, 98 percent of the existing material can be reused. That takes two years and costs 7.5 million euros, he has in one study calculated.
The architect suggests that school classes could accompany the demolition process. The hotel would become a large-scale didactic laboratory. The young people would use specific examples to deal with building, demolition and recycling, with politics, planning and building law, with tourism and the landscape. Firefighters and paramedics could conduct drills in the ruins. A unit of the Spanish army was already there, the soldiers were practicing house-to-house fighting in the Hotel Algarrobico.
Why not leave the hotel in all its shabby ugliness as a grotesque reminder of the years of construction fever and bankruptcy? “No way, the hotel has to go!” says the architect. There are far too many illegal buildings in Spain that have been left standing. «The ‘Algarrobico’ is a symbol for what must not be. For once, the power of the factual should not prevail. We want to set an example.”
The fight against the hotel in the nature reserve led and leads first and foremost the environmental organization Greenpeace. With legal steps, she obtained the building freeze and, with a year-long campaign, made this building sin a national issue. In several places in Spain, environmentalists have the demolition of illegally built hotels and the renaturation has meanwhile been enforced. In Carboneras, this has not yet been achieved, the memorial, on the facade of which is emblazoned the memorable giant lettering “Hotel ilegal”, does not want to go.
Corruption and black money
In 1988 the Spanish Coastal Law was passed, which was intended to protect the coast from development. It was the first such law in Europe. But it hasn’t been used for a long time, says Pilar Marcos Rodriguez, Campaign manager at Greenpeace. On the other hand, construction law was liberalized, which led to the real estate bubble in Spain. This burst, leaving behind many new building ruins along the coasts.
The Conservative majority in parliament watered down the Coastal Law in 2013, ostensibly to boost the economy. Furthermore, buildings and hotels were built too close to the water. Today it is feared that some of these facilities will be endangered by the forthcoming rise in sea levels. A new reform of the coastal law is in the works, but it is unlikely to succeed before next year’s general election.
Greenpeace representative Marcos Rodríguez says the construction mafia has carried out its projects with corruption and black money, while ignoring the applicable laws. Complaints were often without consequences, some courts were not even able to deal with such cases quickly because there was a lack of specialized lawyers. As a result, there are now only a few kilometers of unspoiled coastline in the southern Spanish provinces of Alicante and Málaga.
It will continue to be built in the “Moorish” style
“The old development model is still strong,” says Marcos Rodríguez. “It’s still attractive for many local politicians: Buildings are being built, voters are being promised investments and jobs. The attitude is the same as before. Only the language has changed, they are now supposedly building ‘ecological hotels’.” But that is “greenwashing”.
In Carboneras one seems to want to stick to the previous building policy. New houses and settlements in “Moorish” style are under construction or recently built along the coast, also in the sheltered 100-meter range. The municipal administration is prepared for inquiries from journalists. the press secretary, Ana Lopez Otero, presents the complicated legal situation and otherwise refers to a communique from September 2021. The mayor emphasizes the “comprehensive cooperation of the municipality in the implementation of the order of the judiciary”. Difficult when the courts contradict each other, but also convenient. The mayor is not available.