Amics de la Rambla wants the owners of the commercial premises on the promenade to be more involved in the selection of the businesses they end up hosting, to worry about what those who pay them such succulent rents do. This is one of the main objectives of Pau Bosch, the new president of the association of residents and merchants of the most visited axis of the city, the most international showcase of Barcelona.
“There is no other way to renew our offer,” says Bosch, flanked by Fermín Villar, the outgoing president after nearly eight years. The majority show little interest in the Rambla. Why has the immense premises occupied by H been closed for so long?
Before the outbreak of the pandemic, no cannabis-related product business was operating on La Rambla. Some supermarkets offered, along with bottles of sangria in the shape of a bull or bullfighter, marijuana leaf crushers with the image of the Sagrada Família or the letters of Barcelona... But after normality was restored, they opened up to seven on the Rambla. establishments selling cannabis-related products, six of them specializing in sweets with psychoactive properties, in gummies that go to your head. And the truth is that in a place where it is usual to pay at least 10,000 euros a month for a handful of square meters, a difference of just 1,000 does not seem so crucial.
“The problem – adds Fermín Villar, the former president of Amics de la Rambla – is that it is very difficult to contact the majority of the owners of commercial premises on the Rambla. We tried, but it turned out to be more complicated than we expected. According to official data, the Rambla has 122 buildings and around 800 commercial entities, including offices and other economic activities that are not located at street level. Through the property registry, the usual thing is that you find a company that even has a telephone number or email. Sometimes you find a manager, a lawyer or a property administrator, but they usually act as a barrier. “His role is to protect his client.”
A family capital investment fund of South American origin owns three buildings: a hotel, another commercial and a third with offices and homes. And there is no way to address them directly. Beyond their affairs, funds usually show no interest in more everyday matters, such as Christmas lights. Real estate sources detail that for some time now, especially since the departure of Ada Colau from the mayor's office, these foreign entities are focusing more than ever on the most central commercial premises as an alternative to single-owner residential buildings, each increasingly difficult to find and also more problematic. And on top of that, a good part of the local owners, the people from here, are not very worried about their properties becoming souvenir shops. They also say on the Rambla that there is no way that one fine day the heiress of twenty properties will come down to the promenade. Apparently the Rambla makes him sick.
“These years we were able to contact very few owners,” continues former president Villar. But some did show themselves willing to collaborate with Amics de la Rambla, owners of buildings where hotels operate in one part and who care about the activities that the rest of the property hosts, who do not rent it to just anyone, who think that offering quality activities also benefit them.” “We will continue working like this,” says Bosch, the new president of Amics de la Rambla, architect, real estate manager and also a resident of the promenade. If we want young people to come for the first time, so that those who leave the Liceu do not leave at full speed, if we want to relaunch the Rambla, the involvement of the owners is key. The ideal would be to set up an APEU, as the Born merchants plan, but for this we also need your complicity.”
An APEU is an urban economic promotion area, the Catalan version of the Anglo-Saxon BIDs, of the business improvement district, a public-private collaboration formula where businesses in an area pay more to the administrations in exchange for being able to participate in the management of its services. The government of Mayor Jaume Collboni is working so that the regulations that will make the APEU possible are ready at the beginning of next year. What happens is that to move forward it needs the support of most of the economic activities in the place.
“We will also propose to the City Council the possibility of developing a new use plan,” Bosch continues. To diversify the offer we need a more flexible one. Today you can only open textile shops that end up functioning as disguised souvenir shops... ”.
Or cannabis candy stores, with gift shop or florist licenses, thus taking advantage of the legal loophole. The municipal government recently announced, after an agreement with Junts, that it will develop a specific license for these businesses. “We hope it will be done soon... We need the complicity of the owners, but also of the City Council.” At the end of the day, as former President Villar often says, what happens on the Rambla is a sometimes somewhat lysergic preview of what will happen in the rest of Barcelona.
