Various land filming sets and a maritime, producers, an outdoor versatile auditorium, training and research spaces linked to the digital, audiovisual industry or the video game, homes for the workers of the companies that are installed in the enclosure, restoration and leisure services ... of prospering the project that drives the richest man in Mexico, the tycoon Carlos Slim, the cement of Vallcarca will become a technological city for a technological city the one that the tycoon has compromised an initial investment of 300 million dollars. A Cinecittà version 3.0 on the seafront of Garraf that will regenerate and bring life back to the old factory colony (an authentic town where 5,500 people lived around the factory between 1950 and 1960) and on which, according to its promoters, several audiovisual companies based in Los Angeles have already set their sights, in addition to Sir Richard Branson's Virgin group.
On paper, Slim's Fomento de Construcciones y Contratas (FCC) macroproject seemed like a winning bet. The mayoress of Sitges, Aurora Carbonell (ERC), welcomed the initiative and defended it as "a great opportunity for economic development" in the municipality of Garraf. But the protests by environmental groups and the incorporation of Verds En Comú Podem into the government team could leave him in a stand-by situation.
At the moment, no one wants to advance positions while waiting to know all the details in the meeting that they will hold this Monday with the heads of the OUA studio led by the architect and urban planner Jordi Artigas, although months ago, then in opposition, the group of commoners, whose candidate, Carme Gasulla, currently holds the double department of Urban Planning and Territory and Environmental Action and Ecological Transition, had come to describe it as an "urban ball" and in any case advocated for opening a participatory process to seek sustainable and future alternatives for the cement space.
“The idea has spread that the project is located within the Garraf Park, which is a protected natural space, but that is not the case. The cement plant is much older, it was installed here in 1903 and the land has never belonged to the park, but is classified as urban land for industrial use. But it is also that, of the 49 hectares that we have, we only transform 16.5, while we transfer 20.9 to the park and the rest we turn into a green area”, defends Jordi Artigas, the architect of a project that was taking shape during his trips from Sitges, where he lives, to Barcelona, where he has his studio, through the curves of Garraf.
“I saw the decline of the factory, increasingly obsolete and with less activity. It is a place that is part of our historical heritage and has a privileged strategic situation. It has its own train station, closed in 1994, and an industrial port that no ships have entered or left lately... And it occurred to me that it would be interesting to regenerate the old facilities and turn the site into a high-level technological city linked to cinema and knowledge. An audiovisual cluster in a city like Sitges, which has an internationally known film festival... I proposed the idea to the owners and they found it very interesting”.
The Artigas team, which has had the collaboration of the studio of the architect Josep Mias in the projection of the new buildings, foresees the preservation of a part of the structure typical of the cement industry, such as the geodesic dome of 50 meters in diameter of the deposit that was used to store the clinker and under which concerts and other outdoor activities will be held. Another of the key points is the recovery of the old stream to the beach and the regeneration of its flora and fauna.
The main stumbling block, and the reason why the project has caused misgivings on the part of the administrations, has to do with the construction of homes. The fear is that a profitable real estate operation is hidden behind the initiative. "The houses are for residential use by the employees of the companies that establish themselves here," Artigas interrupts. “We have commissioned a study from the consulting firm Deloitte that estimates that the project will generate more than 2,000 jobs. It makes no sense that all these people have to go and live in Castelldefels, Gavà, Sitges, Cubelles...First, because the price of housing is outrageous and, second, because this project wants to be a model from the point of view of sustainability, practically self-sufficient from an energy point of view, and it would be contradictory with the daily displacement of more than 2,000 people, with the carbon footprint and the strong environmental impact that this would entail”.
"We don't want to make an industrial estate, but a technological center where people can live and work", continues the architect, and gives the example of the 22@ experience, where a 10% housing ceiling, compared to 90% of economic activity, did not quite make a city and the former mayor Ada Colau herself promoted a modification to triple it. “The model does not work if there is no activity. At night and on weekends there is no one, the fabric is abandoned... And that is what we do not want to happen here, but in no case are we thinking of second homes or similar. It is about being able to live in the place where you work and that this life can also be complemented with leisure”. 50% of the new constructions -a percentage higher than that required by law- will be used for social housing.
But still new doubts arise. In a free market, how can someone from outside the complex be prevented from acquiring a flat, either for personal use or for speculative purposes? “It is a challenge and we have to finish talking with the City Council to see how we agree on it because legally it is very complex. But what is clear is that young people will hardly be able to come to work in these companies if they have to go live in Sitges and pay 7,000 euros per square meter”, reasons Artigas.
The new Vallcarca project also contemplates the implementation of two hotels, one in the complex where the companies will be located, and a second in the port, to the south of the train tracks. In addition to the recovery of the beach, recreational, commercial and restaurant spaces would be installed in this area, as well as an aquatic set to shoot scenes in the sea, which would give it a uniqueness and a greater degree of competitiveness compared to other campuses such as Ciudad de la Tele, in the Madrid town of Tres Campos, where, among other companies, the American production company Netflix is installed.
Artigas insists that it is a model of transformation of an industrial area that has been carried out successfully in other European countries, and cites King's Cross in London as reference examples, which combines residential, commercial, university and business uses, or Hamburg's Hafen City, a decadent port area transformed into a cultural and economic neighborhood whose great architectural symbol is the headquarters of the Philharmonic designed by Herzog.
The Vallcarca cement colony was built at the beginning of the 20th century by the Fradera company to house its workers, who had their own homes, school, market, church, cinema, theater, gym and even a soccer field. The last neighbor of hers was Dolores Ajaro Casas, who abandoned her in 1971.
