Life passes, Joan Manuel Serrat plays a retreat at Sant Jordi and the escalators of Montjuïc still not working... The singer-songwriter's audience, mostly retired, came to each section on Tuesday hoping that they would be activated. Yesterday, at the second concert, things were looking better, although it is common knowledge that two thirds of the time these stairs are out of service.
“They are three decades old since the Olympics and they break down often, no matter how much we spend a fortune on maintenance. It's time to renew”, argues the councilor of the Sants-Monjuïc district, Marc Serra. And although the five million Next Generation funds for its replacement have just been approved, the works will not start until 2025. Why?
“First you have to tender the works and put them out to public competition. And the arrival of the money coincides with the period in which Barça occupies the Estadi Olímpic while reforming the Camp Nou (2023-2024). We cannot have 60,000 people every two weeks going up and down the mountain and that the works are at full capacity”, warns Serra.
Nor will they be able to have them going up and down the stairs like in the last century... Of course, in case it is useful to the public, both football and culture users, bicing will arrive at Montjuïc next year . There will be a deployment of eight stations and electric bicycles with which to overcome the orographic unevenness. In addition, in the first semester, before Barça disembarks, a bike lane will be built to connect Plaza de España with Ferrer i Guàrdia, Avenida del Estadi Olímpic and Miramar.
Other unexpected advantages will be the shuttle buses that, without a doubt, in the case of soccer, will practice a greater frequency than that which is generally verified in the concerts that are held in the Olympic ring. On the other hand, and according to the same councilor of Drets de Ciutadania i Participació of the district, work is being done on the assiduousness of the 150 bus that connects different cultural facilities in the park and that now has a stop on Lleida street, thus facilitating its use by the people of the neighborhood who go to the schools of the area.
With regard to cleanliness – dog feces that are stepped on due to lack of light, stench, etc. – Serra assures that since September there has been a “relevant qualitative change”. The task no longer falls to Parcs i Jardins, which could not take care of the entire area, but to Neteja, with specialized personnel even in vertical cleaning that unevenness requires.
More pending things... night lighting. The lighting of two of the historic paths that were widely used a century ago, such as the Montjuïc 360 path, will begin. "The presence of Barça now allows us to develop lighting at the accesses to the Olympic ring," the councilor also indicated. In other words, it will improve the experience compared to that of Serrat's public, today, at his last concert.
A blue zone has also been set up in the MNAC and Poble Espanyol, although you have to leave the exhibition halfway to go out and extend the two hours allowed by the parking meter... "We are in the first phase of the plan, that of drafting projects, almost 300, of which we are prioritizing a quarantine ”, he says.
The unstoppable life that takes place on Montjuïc, especially since the pandemic has turned citizens into nature and cultural facilities have shown their drive to make their demands heard through the Viu Montjuïc festival, is not matched by the slow preview of the Pla d'Actuació 2019-29 with which the City Council wants to arrive on time to celebrate the centenary of the Universal Exposition.
Since the Archaeological Museum landed in 1932 and, in 1934, the MNAC (then the Art Museum of Catalonia), there are countless cultural facilities that have been located on the mountain in the last half century: public, private, consortia... from the Miró Foundation at the Free Theatre, Mercat de les Flors, Theater Institute, CaixaForum, Ethnological Museum, Mies van der Rohe Foundation... And the Poble Espanyol or the Saló del Manga and Sónar at the Fair.
All of them have been warning of the need to humanize the space. Pepe Serra, director of the MNAC, never tires of remembering that “this is not a forest, it is an urban park, it should be our New York Central Park, where there is a Metropolitan Museum, green areas of the city, litter bins, lights, people doing sports ... a space that is accessed calmly”.
It has rained since the ambitious Muntanya de Cultura project to which Xavier Trias aspired as mayor. Now something much more austere but effective is being requested: that the area be clean, illuminated, better communicated and signposted or with many more buses circling the circuit. That the update of the park be carried out, that the road plan be carried out. And no one loses hope.
“Montjuïc is a unique cultural and innovation hub in the world, and it's not demagogy, that's how it is. Laugh at the Madrid Triangle or the Berlin Island. It is a great amount of cultural muscle and that must be taken care of, because Barcelona has evolved but the park has not done so at the same rate. You have to open it up to society, to these older people who can't find their car back”, warns Juan Carlos Martel, director of the Teatre Lliure.
“It is a magical mountain, it does not only have high culture, there is everything, it must be promoted as a green space for diverse activities, even for botanical studies. All of us who work here become fans of the park”, says Marko Daniel, director of La Miró.
The entities are willing to collaborate but they miss a municipal interlocutor to consolidate the conversations. And it is not clear that the Viu Montjuïc will be held for the third time. The City Council invests 130,000 euros in this festival, which it sees more as a "showcase of the cultural potential of Montjuïc" than as a strategy to advance improvements, which was what it was about. The first two editions were held without anything having changed, before which some facilities wonder if it would not be better for the council to use that money to comply with the execution of the demands.
