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Next to what will be the future Oceanika apartment complex in Torremolinos is a footbridge that goes over the railway line which should link Calle Sistema Ibérico with Calle Ava Gardner. On the latter side is the Atenea school.
However, due to its poor condition, the footbridge is unusable. The "restoration" of the structure, which could also involve its demolition and subsequent reconstruction, requires no less than 500,000 euros, according to government sources.
The state of the footbridge has been the subject of talks for several months between Torremolinos town hall and the railway infrastructures administrator (Adif). This is because, although the state company built the bridge for pedestrians, it is actually owned by the town hall. The problem is that, until last October, the ownership was not clear and, as a result, nobody has maintained it.
The origin of this confusion can be traced back to the early 2000s. With the Socialist minister of public works, Magdalena Álvarez, and a Partido Popular (PP) politician, Pedro Fernández Montes, the then mayor of Torremolinos, the government carried out work to improve the Málaga-Fuengirola railway line, which included the bridge.
According to Adif sources, as a rule such bridges fall under the responsibility of town halls once the construction is finished. However, this did not happen in Torremolinos and it has not been until this term of office that the problem has been solved. The councillor for urban regeneration, Marina Vázquez, sums it up in one sentence: "No government team had ever bothered before."
Once the responsibility for maintenance has been clarified, another complication arises: finding the money to undertake it. Torremolinos town hall recognises that it does not currently have the budget for for the work, although it does not deny that it is necessary. In fact, it is already working on other footbridges that it has just recognised as its own, but they are manageable investments for the municipal coffers.
As for the Los Álamos bridge, several options are open, including requesting Adif's help or exploring other ways to meet the cost, such as having the state-owned railway infrastructure company advance the investment. Any project affecting the footbridge has consequences for transport along the entire coast, since it is difficult to work on the railway line without disrupting the Cercanías train services.
The footbridge, which for years has been useless as it was close to the old Los Álamos hotel, which has also been abandoned, will become meaningful again once Oceanika opens its doors. The new residential complex, which is due to open next summer, has 180 flats and there will also be a supermarket on part of the land.
The parents association (Ampa) at the local school had already complained of the poor state of the footbridge, as did IU-Podemos in April. This points to the real possibility that the abandoned footbridge could cause an accident, given the risk of someone climbing up and falling, or part or all of the footbridge falling onto the railway line.
The two accesses to the bridge are regularly fenced off by municipal workers, although it is also true that these closures are often ignored, with the danger that this entails.
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