For those of you worried about CML’s recent shenanigans I urge you to look to the future, not your future but to your great great (great…?) grandchildren’s… Here’s why… If sea levels rise 100 metres Alta de Lisboa will be a very exclusive little island. No wonder Mr Salgado said Alta is Lisbon’s last hope.
So we (well we if we get the rejuvenation technologies solved fast enough) could end up with something like this:
Or this:
Or (harking back to Alta’s former days and when we are hosting multiple refugees from the oil crisis and population explosion) this:
And this proves it It must be named Alta de Lisboa so the Alta can later be dropped to leave Lisboa.
Lisbon city council has recently announced many plans to revitalize the city in many areas such as Alcantara and Baixa Chiado. They reached international fame recently when politician José Sá Fernandes was hailed as a fighter against corruption by Al Jazeera.
Unfortunately, although the corruption might have been fought, there is little momentum to finish projects that were started 20 years ago. It would seem that the game is to get money into Lisbon and then quietly pretend all is normal when the plans fall through.
In 1984, prominent politicians made a case for re urbanization of the Northern limit of the City in a bold plan to extend the main axis of the city. The project has gone ahead and now 6% of Lisbon’s residents live there. Sadly they live in an unfinished project. Promised infrastructure has not been delivered, new building has been endlessly delayed and even simple pavements to metro stations are left unfinished as evidenced by the local offices for the PS, who alerted the council, and only received a response six months later- the response being that it is behind due to bureaucratic difficulties.
Now it is here that lies the core of the problem. The council took six months to reply to local queries about an unfinished pavement. Surely a simple solution for a pavement can be found. The problem was of a bureaucratic nature. Alta de Lisboa has many projects on a far larger scale and most of them are stopped for the very same reason. Alta de Lisboa is built largely on old squatter lands and farms.
This week’s Lisbon edition of Time Out had as a cover story, Lisbon in 2021. In the opening pages of the article Manuel Salgado, Lisbon’s Architect in charge of urbanization, made enough claims to fill two pages. Let me give you an outline : Baixa Chiado will be completely rehabilitated (in 10 years) There won’t be cars but bicycles, there will be lifts built up to the castle. Cais Sodre will have a new Marina, housing and commerce covering 50 thousand square metres, alongside new Cruise ship terminals. Alcantara will have new underground train connections and a new project of reurbanization. Belem and Pedroçous will also undergo a dramatic change. Avenida Liberdade will be pedestrainised (or at least that is what he dreams) and Parque Mayer will magically revitalise the whole area. Avenida Republica will have many more trees, Campo Grande will be extended to Campo Pequeno and the traffic will run in tunnels underneath. Do I need to go on? Well, I shall, but just to mention that Alta de Lisboa was mentioned very briefly, as currently being the back of the city, however it would be very different in 20 years’ time (that will be 45 years after the projects conception). Does one need to look any further for signs?
This is a council who cannot finish a pavement in a project area due to bureaucracies? Lisbon needs to sort out its internal problems first then finish some of the projects it has already started. Then there would be some credibility in the claims. How can any one of these projects ever be finished? In Alta de Lisboa the road that runs round the North to East to the South and then links with Campo Grande was supposed to be finished in 2004. Just last month the council announced that the project which had taken years to negotiate would be re-evaluated and subject to further study for a different solution. So how can the new council really believe they can do all these other projects? The only answer can be that they don’t. They need your money.
The Lisbon council and its current team are creating an incredible dream… really, really in-credible.
According to SIC noticias Portugal’s Prime Minister gave a message of positivism and change…
“Ao contrário de outros, este Governo não está aqui para adiar tudo outra vez mas para concretizar um projecto de modernização e fazer com que Portugal recupere o seu atraso”, disse, antes de visar a oposição, embora sem nunca nomear partidos ou sindicatos.
“A força das modernidade não é seguramente protagonizada por quem quer que tudo fique na mesma, por quem se opõe a qualquer reforma, ou por quem resiste a qualquer mudança por mínima que seja essa mudança. Esses não aprenderam nada com a História”, apontou o primeiro-ministro.
De acordo com Sócrates, a força da mudança “também não está entre aqueles que escolhem o caminho da facilidade e do oportunismo, que vão para onde sopra o vento e andam atrelados em relação a qualquer protesto ou sinal de descontentamento”.
“A mudança não virá também daqueles que cultivam a descrença e se alimentam do pessimismo. Esses já falharam mesmo antes de começar, porque não confiam nos portugueses”, acrescentou, antes de reivindicar para o PS o papel de “força da mudança”.
So gone are the days of backward delays.
Or not….
One (if not the only) of the most important entrances to Alta de Lisboa is a connection to the Axis of the city (Av Liberdade, Republica, Campo Grande). The Eixo central is meant to link to this through the Porta Sul. Recent revelations made by Viver who met with RTP television station found out more about this situation:
Basically what is said is that the project, as it stands, will not go ahead. It is, as they say, too expensive. Further study is needed and a “provisional solution” will be found.
Now please will someone explain how this makes our country (yes I’m a citizen here who pays plenty of taxes and carries out my civic duties) not appear backwards.
Surely further study means more money spent. A provisional solution means spending more money and then spending more later. How can a project that has been approved be unapproved and then more money spent on a further project?
Here’s what I believe is going on…
No one wants to spend money here until the plans for the airport are finalised. Then they can all dive in and “fill their pockets” and claim that the solution has finally been found. (The opening of Eixo Norte Sul, the end of the new highway, which was meant to open 20 years ago, was suddenly finished in a wave of self congratulation for finally finishing something).
Shouldn’t the politicians be embarrassed? I rather hope the civic groups don’t take this sitting down and accept the council’s half baked answer.
My 2 cents worth.
(note to self: Bookmark or print his page a refer back in 20 years when the provisional solution is finally changed for a more permanent one)
The problem of vandalism in Alta has been touched upon by others and sometimes the problem attracts some controversy. The other day there was a party in the social centre and kids after the event were throwing stones at other children, the building and the lights. I suggested on another blog that events such as these (where there are lots of teenagers present) that there is some form of police presence to act as a deterrent to vandals and violence. Their presence need not be overstated or even that obvious, just that it should be there.
Here is a quick demonstration of what has happened in the last three years in our building. It is a sad sight and seeing money being poured into hiding this from potential new customers of other buildings (hence the white boarding around Parque Oeste) instead of policing and fixing the work of unruly kids is painful.
Without further ado, here is the video.
I should add that all of these pictures are from ONE building in Alta de Lisboa (namely 15.5 in Cond Torre)
After my last post I was very sad to read that a child is fighting for his life after falling in the water in Parque Oeste (Parque Vale Grande).
The need for a security presence in the park is obvious and one wonders why the City council chose to remove the two permanent security guards in favour of a security company which I have yet to see in the park (despite my going there everyday). Before the change, one never saw children in or close to the water (and on a less serious note nor was there any graffiti).
The council’s general neglect of the area has been widely reported and even their own video of images of the park shows weeds and negelected flowerbeds as well as dry burnt grass.
Considering the nature of the lakes in the park (ie at the bottom of sometimes steep hills and filled with run off from drains) I should think that the council would put fences around the lakes. It is high time someone had the balls (excuse my French) to sort out some of the problems with the park.
