The Arona City Council announces plans to modernise the Infanta Leonor Auditorium in Los Cristianos, equipping it with new lighting, sound, audiovisuals, and furniture. Additionally, it will enhance access for people with reduced mobility. The Council is collaborating with the Cabildo to expand the lobbies and replace the spiral stairs between floors, pending approval by both administrations’ technicians.
“Excluding civil works, we’re looking at an equipment upgrade estimated at around 300,000 Euros, although there may be additional requirements advised or mandated by the Cabildo in compliance with new regulations,” stated the councillor. These words were from the Culture councillor, Javier Baute, who emphasised that “upgrades at the Infanta Leonor Auditorium are necessary. The City Council has budget allocations for them, and we can carry out the works using our own funds, but we are exploring financing options with the Cabildo on a 50/50 basis for each administration.”
In this vein, the Arona councillor warned that waiting to start the works would not be prolonged. “If waiting for the Cabildo means years of delay, then we will proceed with self-funded investment because we cannot postpone the improvement works much longer.”
The Infanta Leonor Auditorium was inaugurated on March 12, 2011, and was designed by architects José Francisco Arnau Díaz-Llanos and Francisco Javier Álvarez Muñoz. Its construction aimed to provide Arona with a venue for the dissemination of art, in particular, and culture, in general. Since its opening, it has become the premier cultural hub of the Arona municipality. Currently, 13 years later, the Arona City Council is finalising details to equip the Auditorium with new facilities, as explained by the local government.
Javier Baute stated, “We will adapt spaces and access for people with reduced mobility to both the stalls and the stage, as well as provide special areas for them and everything required by regulations to comply with them.” He further noted, “We are considering carrying out civil works to modify, improve, and expand the lobbies, as well as replace the spiral stairs between the different floors with ones compliant with the standards,” highlighted the president of the Arona Culture Board.
A large part of the administrative work involves identifying all the venue’s needs for adaptation to current regulations and inventorying obsolete or damaged equipment for replacement,” in order to enhance the quality of services and make it more appealing to producers and promoters. “All of this, to be reflected in the quality of events and in the satisfaction of the attending audience,” the Culture councillor appreciated.
Councillor Baute expressed, “We hope to have the budgets finalised by the end of this month in order to start, at the beginning of May, working with the regular administrative procedure of a major contract: preparing the specifications, uploading to the contracting platform, public exposure, and selection, among other matters.”
