What will the new Platja d'Aro seafront look like?

Playa de Aro will begin an ambitious renovation of its seafront in September. The project will be carried out in three phases and will not only modernize the current promenade, which, according to Mayor Mauricio Jiménez, "dates from the 1990s and has aged poorly," but will also extend it to the port of Aro, thanks to the work carried out 30 years ago. When the project is completed in 2030, the new promenade will stretch along the municipality's two kilometers of beach.

The first phase of the work, with a budget of approximately €800,000, will begin after the summer on the southern stretch, between the port of Aro and Avenida Verona Terol, where the project will be carried out "with naturalized criteria": a gravel path with dunes will be created to separate it from the beach area. Between the path and the Els Enamorats pine forest, vegetated areas will be created and benches will be installed. The work will be carried out by the State. "By next year's summer season, this more naturalized section should be completed. This will represent a major change in this section, as it has never been urbanized," the mayor assures.

The claimed walkway over the Ridaura

In a second phase, which the City Council hopes to have completed by the 2027 summer season, a new footbridge will be built over the Ridaura River, which flows into the south side of the Platja d'Aro seafront. The river makes it difficult to walk along the seafront from the promenade to the Port of Aro, and for this reason The City Council has long been claiming this footbridge, It will cost 3 million euros, initially assumed by the City Council after the State drafted its project and the work was delayed due to administrative disagreements with the Catalan Water Agency (ACA). To unblock this, the council decided to take over the work. According to the mayor, the money for the footbridge has already been included in this year's municipal budget, and the intention is that the State—when the budget is approved—will allow the City Council to "recover this investment through a subsidy."

The footbridge will be built on a concrete pylon and will be 72 meters long and 3.5 meters wide. The structure will be made of metal and paved with concrete. Along the footbridge section, river walls will be constructed. Access to the footbridge, which will have a lighting system in the handrail, will include access ramps on both sides, as well as stairs of varying width.

A seafront promenade to reactivate social activity

The waterfront, encompassing the most urban area, from Paseo Ridaura to Cavall Bernat, already has the guidelines from a competition launched by the City Council, which must be included in the construction project. The works, which will cost approximately €10 million, are expected to be completed in five years. According to the winning project, by the Lola Domènech and Studio Joy studios and entitled "A Walk Through the Pine Forest," the number of trees will triple, shops and restaurant terraces—separated from the building facades—will occupy a maximum of half the area, and the promenade will be widened with platform decking. Children's play areas and wooden platforms for shows or other recreational activities will be installed, and the paving and water and sewage systems will be updated, among other projects. Of the cost of the works, the City Council expects half to be covered by the State, which has already assumed, through a subsidy, part of the cost of the ideas competition and the drafting of the project.