The airports authority Aena and Palma town hall are engaged in something of a war of words over the problems at arrivals parking at Palma Son Sant Joan Airport.
On Thursday, Aena issued a statement: "The airport, given the bad practice among many drivers who stop before entering the arrivals express car park and generate a danger for traffic, decided for safety reasons to install a barrier to eliminate this dangerous practice. It is important to bear in mind that Aena does not have the power to penalise when bad practice occurs. What it does is to notify the local police, as it is the competent authority."
Although it has been established that there isn't a service agreement between the airport's management and the town hall to pay for police presence, the town hall says that "the local police go to the airport on a daily basis, especially to control taxis and loading/unloading".
"For Easter, a service instruction was issued for the motorised transit unit to pass each day at different times, as was done. Aena is responsible for surveillance of the parking and it does so with the contracted security service. The police serve the entire city and cannot have a permanent unit. For this reason, Aena has direct contact to request the presence of the local police at times of urgent need. Over Easter, it did not request this."
The town hall meanwhile continues to argue that there should be thirty minutes free parking at the arrivals express car park (which has 84 spaces) rather than fifteen. "This would be the solution to the problem."