Justice opens door to shopping centre project in the Marymar building in Benalmádena
The Supreme Court sets a precedent on the application of the Spanish coasts law, overturns a ruling by the TSJA and asks it to re-evaluate the project
The Supreme Court has opened the door to a project to build a car park and shopping centre in the area of the Marymar building in Benalmádena Costa. The magistrates, presided over by the former president of the Supreme Court and the General Council of the Judiciary (CGPJ) Carlos Lesmes, have upheld the appeal lodged by the company that acquired this property, Jardín de las Cigarreras of Seville.
The Supreme Court has therefore overturned a court ruling of February 2023 of the High Court of Justice of Andalucía (TSJA). The legal controversy is based on the fact that the Marymar building, a former retirement home run by Unicaja's social branch, is located close to the beach, on the strip known as maritime-terrestrial public domain. The case even provoked a clash between the Ministry for Ecological Transition and Demographic Challenge and the Regional Ministry of Agriculture, Fisheries and Sustainable Development, to the point that the matter reached the TSJA because the first of these departments denounced the second.
Location or service needed
When it comes to limiting ownership of land adjacent to the seashore for reasons of protection of the maritime-terrestrial public domain, Article 25.2 of the coastal law establishes that "ordinarily, only works, installations and activities which, due to their nature, cannot be located elsewhere (...) or those which provide necessary or convenient services will be permitted in this area".
The High Court of Justice rejected the Seville company's project because it interpreted that these conditions established by the coastal law had to be fulfilled simultaneously, while the Supreme Court has determined in this ruling, which establishes a precedent, that both are "alternative" issues.
In other words, a project can be carried out in the zone, either because "it cannot have another location" or because "it provides necessary or convenient services", but both conditions do not necessarily have to be met. The Supreme Court ruling does not give the green light to the project, but rather orders the Andalusian court to reassess the legal issues in the light of this jurisprudential precedent.
The project frees up some 2,500 square metres of land and includes a square and 200 parking spaces
The Marymar building was acquired by Jardín de las Cigarreras at the end of December 2023 from the Unicaja Foundation when the property had been unoccupied for more than a decade and despite the fact that a lawsuit between Costas and the Malaga bank had not yet been resolved in the courts. The group had previously obtained a concession from Benalmádena town hall to build a car park with more than two hundred parking spaces in this area, under the old N-340 road, and with the purchase it sought to complete the project with a shopping centre, which it called Marymar Plaza.
The former residence has a built surface area of some 11,200 square metres, 7,500 of which occupy the maritime domain. The Cigarreras Garden project frees up some 2,500 square metres of public land and includes a plaza on a slope to project a building that visually appears to be floating above the sea in order to be more friendly to the environment.
