It was one of the big promises of the newly elected administration at Alcudia town hall. The six bars (balnearios) on Alcudia's beach would be dismantled and rebuilt, all in good time for the start of the 2024 tourism season; from May 1 in other words.
After years of waiting for the bars to be renewed, they were finally going to be. Renewal there will be, but not on time.
The mayor, Fina Linares, accepts that work, which has been contracted, was supposed to have started at the beginning of January but has not. "Although we are late, we think that they (the bars) can be finished in June or mid-July."
At the end of last summer, the bars were emptied by the companies with the concessions and abandoned. The mayor's predecessor, Domingo Bonnín, who was also formerly the councillor with responsibility for beach management, has expressed his concern about this: "The danger they entail, full of broken glass, cables and pipes."
According to councillor Maria Ramos of Unidas Podemos (in opposition like Bonnín's El Pi party), "the work hasn't started due to a lack of budget provision". "The mayor's office and the finance department had to submit the 2024 budget to a council session before October 15. As of today they have not done so. Therefore, there is no approved investment plan." Ramos blames an "unprecedented situation" on a lack of coordination between the finance, contracts and tourism departments.
Alcudia's hoteliers haven't as yet responded to news of this delay. Back in early August, so some six weeks after the new town hall administration was formed, they put out a press release that denounced the condition of the balnearios and demanded utmost urgency in replacing them.
The mayor reacted to this with some annoyance. There had been a meeting with the hoteliers at which she had told them that the tender process was under way. The work would start as soon as possible and be completed in time for the 2024 season.