The former mayor of La Orotava Isaac Valencia Dominguez (CC)ordered the closure of the access stairs to the beach of the ducksin El Rincón, in July 2013. The largest cove of black sand in the municipality once again has an access staircase nine years and three months later, although the works have not been formally received, so its use is not yet allowed, sources warn of the Villero City Council and the Government of the Canary Islandswhich is the public body in charge of signing the reception of these works in the coming days.
Last weekend, beach users began to share images of the finished staircase and many curious people came to the area to see with their own eyes the completion of some works that had gone on forever. The work has come to an end, but we will have to wait for its delivery to be formalized in the next few days so that access is allowed.
The long wait ends at a time of year when the enjoyment of Los Patos beach depends a lot on the tides and the state of the sea. The ideal moment will come next summer, when it will be 10 years and 11 summers since the closure. The reconstruction of the Los Patos staircase It has been a very complex work, which has suffered stoppages and continuous modifications. In 2014 it was commissioned for 106,000 euros. The works began with the demolition of the old staircase and the installation of scaffolding, but a collapse in an unstable wall forced the action to be paralyzed a few months after its start to redefine the entire project and multiply its cost by six. Procedures that took five years.
The work was awarded for the second time at the end of April 2019, but its start was delayed almost six months due to the need to reach an agreement with the owners of the adjoining farms, necessary to be able to move and accumulate the work materials. In October 2019 it was restarted, budgeted at around 500,000 euros, and was to finish between the months of July and August 2020. Those deadlines were not met either and it was necessary to award the work again by a global amount of 650,000 eurosof which 350,765 euros came from the own funds of the El Rincon Consortium. It has also received a subsidy from the Area of Management of the Natural Environment and Safety of the Island Council of Tenerife for an amount of 300,000 euros.
The Government of the Canary Islands had announced in May 2022 that the forecast is that this area of the protected agricultural area of El Rincón will recover its safe access “in the last quarter of the year”, between October and December. It has finally been achieved in the tenth month of the year. The Ministry of Ecological Transition, Fight against Climate Change and Territorial Planning of the Government of the Canary Islands made this announcement after the visit that the minister Jose Antonio Valbuena (PSOE) made to the works, which were then 50% executed. Five months later, they have concluded and the reception will take place in the next few days.
Despite the fact that during the construction process the work received criticism for its visual impact, the City Council and the Government of the Canary Islands have insisted that all administrative procedures and environmental conditions have been complied with “scrupulously”, so that obtained the approval of the Government of the Canary Islands, the Cabildo and the City Council, Costas in the Canary Islands and Costas in Madrid. The use of concrete, now covered with natural stone, is justified because it is necessary to save a cliff with a high risk of landslides. The objective has been to execute a work “for life” and proof of “vandalism”, which in the past already deteriorated softer actions that were tried to be executed in this area of the Villera coast.
This work is one of the interventions promoted by the El Rincon Consortium, the entity that oversees the development of Law 5/1992, of July 15, for the protection of the agricultural area of El Rincón, in La Orotava. This organization was reactivated in 2014 and suffered a criticized stoppage between May 2019 and mid-2020, which also affected the work of Los Patos. It is made up of the Government of the Canary Islands, the Cabildo de Tenerife and the City Council of La Orotava, together with the El Rincón Homeowners Association, the Unión Vista El Teide Neighborhood Association and the El Rincón Ecological Coordinator.
They request that it is not yet accessed
José Antonio Valbuena recalled that the main objective of this action is to guarantee the safety of visitors who access the area and asked to respect the current fences and signage “until the procedure for receiving the work is completed, the new ones cannot be opened.” facilities, so we must ask the public for caution.” The mayor of La Orotava, Francisco Linares García, values the culmination of the work of this expected and demanded work, “necessary to guarantee the safety of beach users”. It is a project that has been complicated over time due to various circumstances and the difficulty of carrying out the work vertically must also be taken into account, “but the important thing is that the work is already completed and it will soon be opened for use and enjoyment, so it also asks users for a little more patience until the work is received by the Government of the Canary Islands”.
