art / sound/ text / context

The way of the Pack Donkey vs. the way of Man. Diagonal Mar. Here we see the great long avenues showing "man's way" of walking: straight, with purpose. There were plans for trees, great open spaces and parks. The spaces are empty, there are few cafes and the parks have gates which lock, cutting off access to the sea. There is little of the famous street life of Barcelona.

Barcelona has experienced sustained growth since the 1992 Olympics. New metro lines have been added, streets widened, and hundreds of new buildings erected to accommodate increased population, tourism and business. To sustain and control urban expansion the socialist government has proposed two plans: first, private initiative and commerce is the priority since it is at the root of Spain's impressive economic growth. Second, since Catalonia's regional government is socialist and the federal government is currently socialist, officials make frequent statements about "sustainable" and "humane" urban development. Projects such as rent-controlled, 30m2 apartments meant for young people and poorer urbanites are proposed to curb the alarming trends of debt and flight into the cheaper suburbs and provinces. And, although parks and beach front public spaces are always included in large scale developments, and the metro is still very cheap and reasonably efficient, most of these political statements about public well-being do not materialise.

Of course urban planning is determined by economic conditions that determine the reality of the projects. Since the Olympics, public and private money has been pouring into Barcelona. The "Barcelona Plan" to gentrify and clean up tangled areas has achieved some popular success. Sections of neighborhoods have been refurbished, a few new museums and schools have been built, some roads untangled and new beaches landscaped. So since the city is doing so well, urban planners see no great need to change their direction.

The prices of apartments have reached levels where even urban professionals struggle to buy something small in an off centric neighborhood. A 60m2 apartment that cost 15,000 euros in 1990 goes on the market today, without renovations, for 320,000 euros at an average of 4,200 euros per square foot. (Just in September 2006, the price for a flat in Gracia went up 6%! This price is untouchable for the average Spanish or Catalan worker. (Average wage is 1,900 Euros a month, 15% lower than the average european income.) But investors swoop down from Paris and London where prices are still much higher, thus maintaining (at least partially) an inflation beyond the income of spanish citizens, previously the 2nd largest group of homeowners in Europe after Ireland.

Meanwhile, massive building projects like El Forum change the fabric of former working class districts with very little thought for how people will live after the work crews leave. In many cases, the lower class must clear out and find a new underdeveloped neighborhood (such as El Carmelo where they had to permanently evacuate several blocks of flats due to the collapse of poorly constructed buildings during inadequately planned tunnelling operations). The upper class, including an increasing number of wealthy northern investors, buy into the bland, modern designs of big developments such as Besos Mar without any consideration for the people they have displaced.

True, the buildings in Besos Mar are healthier, the streets are easier to maintain than the old picturesque, dysfunctional spires of the past. But like the great public housing estates of the last century, the overall feeling of this district is alienation, and its future problems are already visible before construction is complete. It is interesting to see widespread abandonment of unsustainable public housing projects for the poor, while at the same time we see institutional support for segregated, isolated, poorly communicated (often automobile only) modernist castles for the rich. The dreaded problems of neglect, decay, crime and marginalization that brought public housing down will not be relevant here. But other, related problems such as isolation, an increasing distance between rich and poor (both physically and psychologically) and an anonymous, corporate living style that dumps traditional spanish life are some of the many problems we will see in new mega neighborhoods. Even former mayor Joan Clos (known for zipping around town in his car), in a rare moment of self reflection, noticed a lack of life in the area.

Parc Diagonal Mar is a large patch of hyper designed shrubbery that best represents Diagonal Mar's big aspirations. The parc received many strong criticisms locally and internationally: Project for Public Spaces called the park Diagonal Mar Hall of Shame. I do not hate the park as much as some socially conscious architects seem to, but it is embarrassing compared to Gaudi's Parc Guell. But the trend we see in this park is hyper construction, while "details" such people are overlooked.