Alicante City Tourist Board
The Councilor for Tourism, Ana Poquet, reacted quickly to the result of a survey that was released the day before in which cruise passengers, increasingly abundant in the city, considered that long wait in the sun as one of the black spots of a stay in the city, otherwise quite satisfactory.
Poquet explained that the tents are a "provisional" solution while they work "on a definitive one to install sail-shaped canvases that offer protection from the sun and high temperatures while waiting to access the Castle." The measure was taken because yesterday, Thursday, the MSC Orchestra cruise ship arrived in the city, which predicted a high influx of visitors to the fortress.
Opposition councilors, such as Rafa Mas, from Compromís, criticized the fact that the measure was taken in mid-August and as a result of a survey, when it is a problem that is by no means new. "I put two tents and herding," Mas said on his social networks, in addition to announcing that in the next plenary session his group will propose a strategic plan for cruise tourism and a rate that will seriously affect it.
It must be borne in mind that two of the main recreational areas that cruise passengers and tourists in general tend to frequent in Alicante, the Explanada de España and the promenade that connects the Canalejas park with the photogenic Plaza de Luceros, are under construction and cut to the ground. vehicle traffic from the beginning of July and until the end of the summer, at least.
The ditches, the noise of the machinery, the dust and the uneven floor and plagued with fences and other obstacles do not invite the pedestrian promenade either, something that businesses and catering establishments are suffering, which have complained of a planning that harms them in full high season.
Another of the negative consequences of the works, suffered by residents but also by tourists who visit the city by car or travel by bus, are the traffic jams that occur in a city that is not used to suffering them. Avenues like Alfonso el Sabio, Avenida de la Estación or Óscar Esplá, absorb an unusual volume of vehicles that at certain times cause huge traffic jams.
In addition, the municipal opposition and some neighborhood groups have criticized that the works are involving the sacrifice of many mature trees on main avenues, with the consequent disappearance of shade on busy roads.
Manolo Copé, municipal spokesman for EU-Podem, lamented yesterday that Alicante spends two and a half million euros and invests a year in the works of the coastal promenade, "everything to do... a median!", while maintaining "the the same road and of course no bike lanes or trees that provide shade".
The government team defends its management by ensuring that the works are necessary to renew infrastructure and improve urban mobility in the city. And they trust that, once the work is finished, the public will understand that the inconvenience was justified.
