The mayor of Arona, José Julián Mena, announces his intention to seek debate and consensus about defining alternatives to the Port of Fonsalía “that go through modernizing Los Cristianos.” To do this, it will promote meetings with actors related to the maritime connectivity of Tenerife and the rest of the Western Islands, with the port of Aronero as the “epicenter of these communications.” He raises it taking into account that the Isorano port is a project conceived 25 years ago, in a Special Conservation Zone, of high value, and with the environmental impact declaration expired.
He explains that this premise “leads us to a scenario of blocking for years or decades in a process that does not offer any guarantee, since the social values and criteria of the European Union are radically different from those of 25 years ago.” He is facing a time of “paralysis” that “neither Los Cristianos, Tenerife nor the Western Islands can afford”, with the aggravating circumstance that Los Cristianos mobility problems “will get worse, in the meantime.”
Mena advocates that “a constructive and realistic dialogue be promoted, which must go through an investment in Los Cristianos that allows traffic to circulate underground through Chayofita Avenue almost to the highway, generating a modern pedestrian avenue at the top with a transport interchange ». Another point highlighted by the councilor is that such a work is possible with 40 million euros, compared to the at least 200 million that are required for Fonsalía. Mena assures that there were “important advances” in this sense with the government team of the Cabildo de Tenerife in the previous term.
Constructive dialogue
The mayor of Arona will propose “an agenda of meetings and encounters” with the Government of the Canary Islands, the councils of Tenerife, La Palma, La Gomera and El Hierro, the Port Authority, municipalities, associations and social organizations and the University of La Laguna. «It is essential to generate a constructive dialogue in which we find sustainable solutions, respectful of the environment and that is realistic: the environmental impact statement has expired. And that closes a very important part of the debate, “he says.
Mena recalled that Los Cristianos is one of the five ports built on 25 kilometers of coastline, in addition to that of Granadilla. In his opinion, “it does not seem sensible to do new, irreparable damage to an area in which there are alternatives and located in the middle of the Special Conservation Area, with a high environmental and landscape value, such as the place of Guía de Isora that it is proposed, a natural jewel ».
From the Popular Party, deputies Ana Zurita and Sebastián Ledesma ask the central government to report on its “future plans” regarding Fonsalía. They do so by asking the Minister of Transport, Mobility and Urban Agenda to clarify if this project is still a strategic infrastructure, if there is coordination in environmental matters with the different departments involved, if they have carried out the procedures for assigning the land to the Public Domain Port and if the State has studied the transfer of traffic from the port of Los Cristianos to that of Granadilla, an aspect of which it is in favor. The Tenerife deputy demands, in a non-law proposal, “that the project not be abandoned.”
Zurita accuses the Canarian Government of “taking time” to prepare the new Environmental Impact Statement to adapt the work to the requirements of the ZEC Rasca-Teno. In his opinion, a greater involvement of the Port Authority»With the preparation of a strategic document that« values »the port infrastructures and their need for the island’s economy and the rationalization of the use and management of the ports.
