The Minister for the Presidency, Public Administration, Justice and Security, Nieves Lady Barreto, said this Thursday that the future City of Justice in Santa Cruz de Tenerife “will not be completed in two, four or five years,” as it involves “a highly complicated urban operation” that includes the suspension of the city’s planning. She has already indicated that it “most certainly” will not be ready by 2025.
Efforts have been made to find a location for the City of Justice, but “there is no land available at the moment,” so work continues on the planning suspension agreed upon in 2022 for the entire area surrounding the current judicial building on Avenida Tres de Mayo, the minister explained in a parliamentary committee in response to PP deputy Mónica Muñoz.
Nieves Lady Barreto reminded everyone that two legislative terms ago, the Government offered the possibility of relocating the entire City of Justice away from the Tres de Mayo area, but “it could not happen for various reasons.”
The alternative solution is “very complicated to develop,” Barreto continued, because, due to the inability to reach an agreement for acquiring private land, it involves a suspension of municipal planning for the entire area surrounding the current judicial building. This entails the suspension of three more plans and a mobility solution for the southern exit of Santa Cruz de Tenerife.
“It is a highly complex suspension, which is currently being managed by the Department of Territorial Policy,” and with the initiation of the Santa Cruz Verde 2030 plan, “it has been decided that the mobility issue will be addressed there,” Nieves Lady Barreto continued.
Another inconvenience is that “if the planning suspension does not meet the conditions that all parties involved consider necessary,” it is possible that the matter will end up in court, which would signify “an even greater setback.”
Once the land is urbanistically organised, a project will need to be commissioned and constructed, she stated, and in the meantime, “we are implementing some temporary solutions,” such as the purchase of the Auditorium building in December 2023, in which 20 million euros will be invested in its interior renovation.
