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Malaga city's councillor for the environment, Penélope Gómez, has said that she could not believe the statements being made by some experts in the media criticising a particular planning proposal by city council.
Gómez explained that it was "clear" that an infrastructure of the scale of building new 'plazas', a huge square of smaller squares spanning Malaga city's main river and the channelling of that same river, the Guadalmedina, from Armiñán bridge to Aurora bridge with embankments (a project supported by the mayor, Francisco de la Torre), would not be built "without studies backed by experts and without the approval of the civil servants in water resources management."
Still, at one point in her speech at the environment committee meeting, and at the insistence of the opposition groups concerning what might have happened in Malaga had it matched the rainfall in Valencia (up to 700mm), she did not hesitate to say the following: "If it rained in Malaga like it did in Valencia, what we would have to do is climb on those bridges to get into those squares to save ourselves." This turn of phrase along with others led the deputy spokesperson for Con Málaga, Nicolás Sguiglia, to criticise Gómez for being "so confident and so arrogant." The latter replied: "Never the arrogance and moral authority that you use in all your speeches, such that you believe you are in possession of the truth."
When the opposition groups insisted during the environment committee meeting that they consider the rains experienced in the neighbouring region of Valencia, the Popular Party member stressed that Valencia "plays in a different league." Gómez stated: "To begin with, there is no historical data on rainfall in Valencia here in Malaga. However, in Valencia, yes, since the year 2000, there has been that rainfall several times in the last 50 years", so she said that she was "astonished" by the statements that were made in this regard.
The truth is that all the opposition groups - PSOE, Vox and Con Málaga - were against the project for the Guadalmedina bridges-with-squares and the 350-metre embankments between the Armiñán and Aurora bridges. Malaga city council announced last Friday that it will commission an architectural firm to draw up the preliminary project for the partial covering of the river with these wide bridges, despite the fact that the special plan has not yet been approved as it is currently in a preliminary stage pending the completion of its environmental assessment. Still, Malaga council, following last Wednesday's Dana weather event in the city, continues with its roadmap for the Guadalmedina to create a large square that connects Centro district and the pedestrianised area of Trinidad. In fact later, in the updates from the city's planning department (Urbanismo), the environment councillor went further and stressed that they already had the civil engineering reports in, which guarantee that the plan for the bridges-with-squares can be carried out.
Gómez did not give a figure for the drainage capacity of the Guadalmedina river during the peak rainfall of 75mm in one hour, but she did emphasise to SUR after the committee meeting that, although it seemed that the water came up close to the bridges, up to the gauge on each bridge (their maximum height), there was 1.57 metres of water at Antonio Machado bridge (river mouth), 1.59 metres at Misericordia, 2.59 metres at Trinidad and 2.57 metres at Armiñán bridge.
The opposition, PSOE deputy spokesperson Begoña Medina, Con Málaga deputy Nicolás Sguiglia, and Con Málaga deputy spokesperson Yolanda Gómez, reproached the councillor for not thinking about the risks and danger of the new bridges, but she continued to insist that they are safe. "The Guadalmedina has no problem," she insisted, a statement also made by mayor De la Torre last week following the Dana. "The way of exploiting the reservoir has been changed," she continued, "and the water level inside the dam has been lowered," adding that, if it was previously considered that it should release 400 cubic metres per second, it is now at 150 cubic metres per second.
Local residents from Churriana, who came to speak at the environment committee, complained about the awful time they had had during the Dana storm and downpours last Wednesday "because of a park that was built in the Plaza de las Flores which acted as a dyke", as one resident, Rosario Martín pointed out, and about "the construction of a house in Calle Francisco Soto de Langa, which caused the rest to flood." They asked that some account be taken of what they suffered when their whole neighbourhoods and many houses there were flooded. "My wife is disabled and I can't take her upstairs", said a distressed Manuel Ramos, commenting on the flooding that occurred in his street.
What all the groups did agree on, both the PP government team and the opposition groups, not just verbally but also in votes, was that studies should be completed to channel the river Campanillas downstream in order to tame streams such as the Cupiana, which is below Casasola dam, another infrastructure that both Gómez and mayor De la Torre himself had only in the last week declared as essential work.
PSOE councillor Begoña Medina also asked for storm tanks to be built in Malaga city along the lines of those already in Barcelona (11), Madrid (38) or even just like the one that is going to be built in Mijas, according to Mijas town hall. This point, which was amended by the PP government team, also went ahead for further investigation. The last key point to be minuted was that central government, the regional government and Malaga council undertake the necessary studies and work to protect the city's industrial estates near the Guadalhorce from flooding, one of the points of a Vox motion.
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