Palma City Council has announced that it is working on drawing up the specifications for the new concessions on the municipality’s beaches with less space for sun loungers and parasols due to sand erosion. This is what deputy mayor and spokesperson for the council, Mercedes Celeste, had to say when asked about the complaints from residents of Cala Major about sunbed’s taking over the beaches in the area.
Local residents have blamed ‘sunbed overcrowding’ and “greater occupation” on the fact that the concessions have been “out of date for years” and now the local corporation’s government team is working to update them, especially with regard to the coastline, because on Palma’s beaches “there is less sand” than 20 years ago, which is why there is this feeling of “over-occupation”.
“The Town Hall is working against the clock to solve this problem, but there is no alternative to having fewer sunshades and sun loungers, given that these concessions have to be able to coexist on the beaches with the people who don’t use them, and they have to be able to move around.
Celeste pointed out that, following complaints from the residents of Cala Major, the council’s technicians went to check that all the beaches were complying with the terms and conditions of the concessions, something she said was happening, but as the permits were authorised years ago, now “the beach is different”.
In this sense, she complained that “all the concessions” are “expired” and Palma currently has a coastline that is “totally different to what it was 30 or 10 years ago. These expired concessions, which have had to be extended to provide service to beach users, do not correspond to the needs of the beach because of the current coastline,” she said.
Another of the aspects for which she stressed the need to update the specifications is accessibility because, in her opinion, the accessibility regulations during the previous term of office “were not complied with” and this is “extremely serious. The City Council has the obligation to make the beaches accessible to everyone and this is also one of the objectives,” she said.