Maria Buhigas (Barcelona, 1971) has extensive experience in city planning. She has developed it from different areas, including the Barcelona Regional agency. Between 2019 and 2020 she was an independent councilor for the ERC group. In June, Mayor Jaume Collboni appointed her chief architect of the City Council, a responsibility from which she intends to update the quality standards of urban transformations so that they reach all neighborhoods.
Has Barcelona stopped being a world reference in urban planning and architecture?
I do not share this very pessimistic diagnosis. Barcelona continues to attract attention and interest, regardless of the government there is.
Could this critical vision be the result of self-demand, of the continuous self-criticism that characterizes Barcelona?
This is a city where people feel challenged by what happens in them, everyone generates an opinion, everyone expresses it... At family dinners or with friends it is a reason for conversation. I don't know if this is as common in other cities. Here it is expressed formally, in the participatory processes that are opened, but also informally, in day-to-day life.
They also say that the Barcelona Model has been diluted.
For me, the Barcelona Model is the conscious acceptance, through democratic change, of urban planning competition by city governments. Everyone understands that it is the most powerful thing they have and they exercise it. Mayor Collboni has said it more than once, they have not only worried about what concerns them but also about what concerns them. And this does not remain on paper, in theory, there are projects that are executed and have a real impact on people. The City Council sits at a table knowing what it wants. Each government puts its own nuance, but that consciousness is always present, it exercises leadership. This is the model and it has not been blurred.
Urban planning has been a citizen and political battlefield in recent times...
Society is increasingly heterogeneous, with a diversity of interests, expectations, problems... Living together is not easy; It is not in the same house, because in the city, which is like a huge house, neither is it. Governments should not contribute to increasing soufflé. They do not always act to the liking of everyone, but they do so with the best of good faith for the benefit of the general interest. This is not about good and bad. Everyone participates here. Therefore, we must recover a less conflictive tone. Understand this heterogeneity. In a negotiation, everyone must understand that finding a point of agreement means giving up. And, furthermore, there will be technical parts that cannot be waived. But we must also see that there is no magic formula that works the same for all cities. Each one is different. Look, one issue that we have on the table is the imagination that people have about green. Using so many renders, these images practically from the metaverse, of an idyllic city, generates mental frameworks in the citizens of expectations that are not that they are bad, it is that they are not realistic, we do not have that water, nor that green that corresponds to other countries more to the north. We are more likely to get something drier in appearance, brown, beige, a type of green but not all of them. What I mean is that we must contribute to creating a pedagogy that is neither paternalistic nor condescending to the implications that things have.
Are the new green axes of the Eixample perverting Cerdà's scheme?
Plans have a point of expression of a will and their deployment, which involves management, time, resources... many times they transform them. The unique thing about Cerdà that has lasted is the support structure, the grid, and the configuration of the blocks. The city is not made with the car as a starting point, but with transportation and pedestrians as references. It is something that must be claimed. These axes do not pervert the Cerdà plot. They open a debate of a different nature.
In what sense?
The first democratic governments decided that the quality in the materiality of public space was like a layer of continuous bass that went from the neighborhood with the highest income to the one with the lowest. When we begin to make variations within the city, not only of green axes, but of other anecdotes, singularities, what we can end up doing is blurring that layer. This does concern me. If I ask what elements characterize Barcelona's public space, we would have a hard time recognizing them. For a time it was the stone, the granite on the curbs, the fords, all the accessible intersections, the trash can and the traffic light. It seems obvious, but a message of accessibility, material quality and civility was sent. In the next steps we take we cannot lose the overall image. If we are in the 21st century, we will have to talk about shadows, thermal comfort, health, noise... We must specify what this means when transferred to the entire city.
Give an example of a recent successful urban transformation and another that did not work well.
The successful, without a doubt, the Meridiana. Very clearly. Bringing urbanity to a space that was a highway. It is now a civic avenue. Chapó! It started many years ago by widening sidewalks, putting a traffic light at the beginning. They were gestures that pointed a path. They said that the city begins there, that it is a street... And the reform must continue. I think, however, that we didn't quite get the places right. I am not a friend of Glòries's final solution, it raises doubts in my mind. I have nothing against the park. But if we were able to create that large space, I'm surprised that we compartmentalized it. If the three major avenues of the city intersect here, it turns out that the Gran Via goes through a tunnel, which I think is a mistake because this axis should have been tamed, and the Diagonal, which we opened to the sea, does not cross either. Square. Also, I fear that there is not enough intensity on its edges.
Will Cerdà have a monument in Glòries?
I hope that next year we will have it agreed. The city already had one dedicated to him but it was destroyed. We will make a proposal to the partners of this agreement, among which are the professional associations of engineers and architects.
Where is the historic competition between these two groups? Mayor Collboni has recovered the figure of the chief engineer...
I can tell you that the relationship between the chief architect and the chief engineer of this city council has iron health. And also the respective teams. Oriol Altisench and I talk a lot. We agree on many things. Everyone looks at it from their own perspective, of course. But I'm not a typical architect either, I come from urban strategy, I'm used to the work of the Barcelona Regional agency, which is an ecosystem of architects and engineers.
Consell de Cent has been renovated, work is underway on Meridiana, Diagonal, Via Laietana, Rambla... What major axis should be the next to transform?
The Metropolitan Urban Master Plan (PDUM) defines metropolitan avenues as one of its star actions. They are the axes that not only cross us but also connect us with neighboring cities. In most cases, when they left the center they were either blurred or had an interurban character. What is proposed is to convert them into large civic roads. We are already intervening in Meridiana and Diagonal, there are forecasts for the rounds. And now that we have Glòries almost ready, it's time to think about Gran Via.
Does the recovery of block interiors have a long way to go?
The focus has been on outdoor free spaces, streets and squares. Now we are going to look at other free spaces that are not seen as much and that we can take advantage of to do the things we need, such as reducing the heat island effect or gaining greenery... It is not just the interiors of the Eixample. Also the spaces between buildings that do not have quality or others classified as green that do not act as such, with party walls that are permanent and windows could be opened, new plant facades made... We want to value these spaces.
How should we face the housing crisis?
This crisis, like the climate crisis, is global, affecting all cities, both in developed and emerging countries. The difficulty of accessing housing for the middle classes, which are a guarantee of cohesion, does not occur only in Barcelona. Neither of them should be looked at only with a strict city vision. There are multiple scales. In 1979 Barcelona had 1.9 million inhabitants, the highest point, and it began to drop to 1.6 million towards the end of the 90s and has recovered somewhat since then. But we must note that in 1979 the average number of people per household was almost four, three lengths. We are now at 2.3 and falling. We need more housing in absolute terms to house the same population. They can be made smaller but there is a limit to this. Furthermore, we want a mixed city, with different uses. Therefore, iodine cannot be homes. For example, the 22@ that has been criticized for lack of housing, which I agree with, because what is needed is the intensity of the city. An average block in Eixample has 200 homes per hectare. The Vila Olímpica has 80. If we now make operations of 150, we are losing 50 each time. And if there are no people, there is no activity, no businesses... We will not be able to solve all this just within the administrative limits of Barcelona. We won't be able to do it alone. We need a broader, metropolitan view. It is not about creating dormitory cities because we will increase the problem of mobility. We need this city that people want, that is more intense, that is the one we can afford, to overcome these limits. Let's not lose sight of the fact that people do not go to cities to sleep but to work, to look for opportunities.
Should we build more?
We are already creating the spaces of maximum transformation. The 22@, the Sagrera, the Marina del Prat Vermell are the great replacement parts. From now on we will play Tetris. I take out a piece and put it here... But there is no more. It is necessary to act on that metropolitan scale.
Is Barcelona attractive enough for international architects?
The figures that appeared in "The City of Architects" by Llàtzer Moix [book published in 1994] were already most of them local. The level of Barcelona, Catalan and Spanish architecture in the world has been recognized for decades. Architecturally, a city has its challenge in ordinary architecture, not in extraordinary one. What I would like to see is that the quality of the latter increases and I think we are improving. We have the FAD which gives the oldest architecture awards in the country and the majority are from professionals from the Iberian Peninsula. We have local architects who work abroad and also from other countries who are here. Among other things, the law requires us to hold international competitions. Thinking that we need foreign signatures for greater glory seems a bit provincial to me. What we need is quality, wherever it comes from. The City Council has always promoted it in its facilities, in public spaces, housing...
Is the world capital of architecture in 2026 an opportunity to spread this message?
Yes. The capital city must make available to all citizens what architecture is and how it can contribute to improving the quality of their life, highlighting it, generating activities... and that at the end of the year any Barcelonan can explain it.
The Sagrada Família has set a date for the completion of the temple, ten years from now, except for the access stairs to the Glòria façade, which would affect the homes below Mallorca Street. Is it time to address this issue?
The important thing, the novelty, is that, as you said, a date has been set. We can only begin to talk seriously about this matter when things are clear. And now we have a milestone. Twenty or ten years ago we didn't have it. We will talk with the board and those affected about the possibilities that exist, what implications they have...
