The Balearic government has decided to use 15 million euros of Sustainable Tourism Tax (ITS) tourist tax funds, paid by foreign tourists and residents, to help local councils demolish disused hotels and transform their sites into public spaces. The project, presented on Thursday by the Balearic Minister for Tourism, Jaume Bauzà, and the Director General for Tourism, Josep Aloy, is the first time that tourist tax funds have been explicitly allocated to ‘de-congestion’ measures in saturated tourist areas.
According to the Balearic government, the land may be converted into green areas, educational and health centres or social housing, as well as other infrastructure for social use. This initiative is based on a similar programme financed by 16 million euros from European Next Generation funds, which will allow the demolition of four establishments: Es Teix (Magalluf), Hostal Colón (Peguera), Apartamentos Topaz (Calas de Mallorca) and the regeneration of part of the old town of Sant Antoni de Portmany (Ibiza) before the end of this year.
The strategic objectives of the new programme include the effective reduction of tourist accommodation, the regeneration of land degraded by intensive tourism and adaptation to climate change, with measures such as green corridors, shaded areas and spaces that are resilient to extreme heat.
Bauzà stressed that this line of action ‘opens a new stage in the management of tourism resources, in line with climate responsibility and a commitment to improving the lives of residents’. In his opinion, the initiative seeks to go beyond simply limiting the number of tourist places: ‘It is about regenerating the territory and laying the foundations for a more innovative industry that is less dependent on models of unlimited growth’. Local authorities will have up to 18 months to implement the projects and an additional three months to justify them. The total duration of this first call for proposals is 36 months.
The Hotel Teix in Magalluf now belongs to Calvia council and the process of demolition is underway. It is the first obsolete hotel in Calvia to be demolished in the 21st century. The purchase has been financed with funds from the European Union’s Next Generation Recovery, Transformation and Resilience Plan.
In addition to the purchase of the Teix, the former Hostal Colón in Peguera will also be demolished and can be purchased under the same terms. The purchase of both establishments and their demolition will cost almost 6 million euros.
Calvia is not just one of Mallorca's most important tourism municipalities, it is one of Spain's most important. The tourism development owed a great deal to town hall planning of the 1950s that extended basic resorts - Palmanova, Santa Ponsa - that had been created before the Civil War and that gave the go-ahead for completely new resorts.
Approval for the development of Magalluf was given in 1959. The hotel stock was overwhelmingly that of the initial wave of mass tourism in the sixties. Necessary modernisation of a one to three-star offer has been ongoing over the years, but especially so for the past twelve to thirteen years. There are 148 hotels in Calvia with 51,330 beds, 80% of which are now four-star. But aspirations for Calvia go beyond four-star and to the luxury of five-star accommodation.