Last June, the new General Telecommunications Law was approved. A document that forces the Administrations to adapt their regulations to what is included in the standard, but that also prevents planning from being approved without being adapted to this new reality.
And it is precisely this last point that prevents the El Toscal Special Plan from being definitively approved, as planned, which is facing yet another delay in its definitive approval. This new law has given full effect to the processing of a document that has already lost count of the times that long-awaited final approval has been delayed.
This latest setback was confirmed by the Town Planning Councillor, Guillermo Díaz Guerra, who trusts that, despite having to adapt the El Toscal Plan to the new law, it can be approved at the end of the year. “We are already working with the Ministry of Industry and the General Directorate of Telecommunications to adapt, as soon as possible, the document to the requirements of the law. This is a priority and I hope that if everything goes well we can definitively approve the document before the end of the year”.
This affirmation has been made previously by more councilors, those who preceded him in office, and who for one reason or another, have been stumbling, time and time again, with the entry into force of a document that would have to unblock the investment in a historic complex that, in some areas, is beginning to be a BIC in ruins, which will end up being demolished.
It is paradoxical that, while El Toscal waits for an instrument to revitalize its streets, its buildings, right next door, the central La Rosa street, which does not belong to the historic complex, has unlocked its comprehensive rehabilitation with an investment of more than five million euros, and that, if everything goes as it should, next year the work will already be carried out.
Meanwhile, El Toscal will have to adapt to this new General Telecommunications Law, and trust that when the year ends, the government team will take it to final approval.
The El Toscal Special Plan has been in the pipeline for almost 20 years. It was finally approved, but errors in its processing meant that the entire public presentation of the document had to be repeated, something that for the Government of the Canary Islands was insufficient, even pointing out that it is null and void. Finally, as this report was not binding, it was incorporated into the document, and the processing continued. The delay in the arrival of the sectoral reports was delaying their final approval. And when it already seemed that in this first semester there would be that approval, the reality is that now a new adaptation is being worked on.
Perhaps this delay in unblocking the planning is what has led the Santa Cruz City Council to include the neighborhood in the next batch of homes to be rehabilitated through the plans of both the Government of Spain and the European Next Generation funds, for which It is expected that there will be a new call, like the one that has already been signed for 300 homes in Añaza.
If the Special Plan for El Toscal is finally approved, what will be carried out first will be the expropriations included in the document for public endowments. These expropriations are around five million. Pedestrianizations, squares, urban parks, are some of the things that can be done and that includes the Special Plan of El Toscal. You will have to cross your fingers.
