The City Council of José Luis Martínez-Almeida approved this Tuesday, during the municipal plenary session of Cibeles, a special plan to allow the expansion of uses on the land that houses the Madrid Aquatic Center. A structure that was never operational after the failure of the Olympic attempts in the city, despite an investment of 99.6 million euros during the mayoralty of Alberto Ruiz-Gallardón.
The building is unfinished, with work having stopped since 2010, when there was still work worth €91.9 million remaining. An Olympic corpse which cost the public coffers dearly. It is adjacent to the land which will house the future Atlético de Madrid Sports City, where the club chaired by Enrique Cerezo plans to develop new sports facilities, but also shopping and leisure centers, an artificial beach and even a hypothetical private university.
The objective of accommodating some of these uses explains the municipality’s maneuver, according to the spokesperson for the PSOE at the Municipal Planning Commission, Antonio Giraldo. The councilor questions the fact that the Aquatic Center is the subject of this special plan after having been excluded from the modification of the general plan which diversified the uses in the plots already integrated into the Colchonera Sports City: “At that time , we wondered what made it different. The answer surely is that it is a huge concrete structure, very expensive and difficult to maintain, which is why at the time Atlético de Madrid were not sure they wanted to get involved with it . Now they must have a plan.
“As for the rest, what has changed in two years?” asks Giraldo. The socialist councilor also criticizes, in a conversation with Somos Madrid and in the allegations presented by his party (already rejected), that the expansion of uses is not accompanied by a “participatory process”.
The irregularities of a “hidden requalification”
The Almeida City Council itself defended the need for citizen consultation when the Municipal Socialist Group presented allegations against the lack of precision on the future of the Aquatic Center, in a modification of the general plan that left its future outstanding. The municipal government rejected this allegation, because “given the particular characteristics of the existing building, a specific study of its possibilities seems essential, in the preparation of which both the competent municipal services in the matter and the citizens must participate.” Giraldo also questions the absence of “a specific purpose” which justifies the expansion of uses: “It is not explained how this serves the general interest. »
But the main “irregularity” he notes is that the special plan does not even respect the conditions required to increase uses if, as in this case, they are defined as complementary. That is to say, they must respect the same access and times as the space where the main event takes place. In other words, if the main use is a singular facility (category which includes a sports facility, but also a university), the complementary use could be a cafeteria which provides a service without widening its opening or operating in a completely independent manner. The special plan approved this Tuesday, however, “relaxed” these requirements for the land.
The socialist councilor speaks of “a clandestine requalification in which a public grant is withdrawn for private purposes”. He believes that the Aquatic Center park should have been transformed into “a unique public facility, because Madrid does not have any of these characteristics”. Or, failing that, “allocate the land directly to Atlético de Madrid and at least let the club develop a special plan which the Town Hall has now taken on”.
A destination that, for the moment, the Almeida team does not take for granted. Sources from the Works sector tell the newspaper that “any proposal that could reach the City Hall will be studied and, if it interests Madrid, it will be submitted to a public call for tenders.” From Atlético de Madrid, in statements to El Español, they admit that they are “study possible uses to present to the Consistory.
14 years as a ghost structure
The Madrid Aquatics Center stopped construction in 2010, two years before the capital would have hosted the Olympics if the first of three attempts had failed. “The development of the urban area called AOE 00.08 Sector West of the Olympic Park was determined by the resulting scenario after 2012, in which the city was not designated as the site of the Olympic Games of the year 2020,” says the Public Works Department of Somos Madrid. .
The future Olympic stadium becomes that of Atlético de Madrid, the Metropolitano (today renamed Riyadh Air Metropolitano thanks to the sponsorship of a Saudi airline). Around it, various facilities will be integrated into the Cité des Sports, with land ceded by the Town Hall to the colchonero club under very advantageous conditions: the red and white team will spend 53 million euros on public works in exchange for the exploitation of 205,000 square meters. for 75 years. But the Aquatic Center, located a few meters away on these lands in the San Blas-Canillejas district, still had no function or work planned.
The Councilor for Works, Paloma García Romero, pointed out in March that the executive of Manuela Carmena, who led the municipal council between 2015 and 2019, was partly responsible for the abnormal situation of the Aquatic Center. precisely at this time when Cibeles had to respond to an infrastructure started two decades ago: “The definitive suspension of work on the aquatic center took place in 2012. In 2017, the termination of the contract was requested by the construction company and Faced with the silence of the Administration, in 2019, “The courts ordered that the Town Hall approve this resolution of the works contract”.
Compliance with this decision triggered the processing of a series of administrative procedures aimed at the resolution and liquidation of the contracts related to the Aquatic Center, which included not only the construction contract itself, but also the management tasks of the project and safety and security. . Following these procedures, a series of complaints were filed which, according to the Town Hall, “have recently been definitively closed”.
“Only after the full completion of these procedures has the Works and Equipment Zone recovered the legal availability of the aquatic center and is able to analyze possible alternatives for the development of this infrastructure,” said Garcia Romero.
The great emblem of Olympic failure
In December 2004, with Alberto Ruiz-Gallardón at the head of the City Hall, the contract worth 136.7 million euros was formalized between the Municipal Housing and Land Company of Madrid and the Temporary Union of aquatic center companies, formed by Dragados-Ortiz to lift the building. The agreement, lasting 27 months, was subject to subrogation since 2005 in favor of the company Madrid Infraestructura Deportivas, Espacios y Congresos. Since 2014, it has been subrogated by Madrid City Hall itself.
The objective was to transform the installation into the headquarters of the main Olympic aquatic sports: swimming, synchronized swimming or water polo. A 22,000 square meter hall that can accommodate 18,000 spectators, today transformed into an empty (and cracked) shell. Its construction was stopped when the Madrid City Council had paid 99.6 million euros to the construction companies (Ortiz and Dragados) and almost half remained to be paid, since the final cost was calculated at 191.5 million despite the fact that the initial budget was 137. million. This figure has therefore been inflated by more than 40%.
The work was stopped when most of its walls, interior constructions or all of the finishes remained to be erected. There has been no change since in 2010 the Dragados-Ortiz UTE expressed its desire “not to continue the works carried out given that over time they could suffer significant deterioration and cannot determine the damages, implications and costs derived from the suspension,” according to a municipal report.
Everything indicates that the new exploitation will involve the partial or total demolition of the built structure to erect another building serving the interests of the winning entity. And the Royal Spanish Swimming Federation (RFEN) bet in July, in statements to this newspaper, to “promote the project and give it appropriate use as an aquatic facility.” “We are forced to fight for the Madrid Aquatic Center,” Fernando Carpena, president of RFEN, said in 2019. The same year, the federation presented a proposal to try to launch the facility with an investment of 30 million euros, with a possible bid to host the 2031 World Swimming Championships on the horizon. An initiative which was, once again, in vain.
