Barcelona spares the park where the Star Market was to be temporarily installed

BarcelonaBarcelona City Council has granted a reprieve to the Baix Guinardó Gardens. This green space will not have to sacrifice its central lake to temporarily house the Estrella market. This information was released... The Newspaper As confirmed by ARA, the city council has changed its plans and will renovate the current market without needing to move the stallholders to a new location. This was announced on Monday by the new councilor for the Horta-Guinardó district, Sara Belbeida, to the residents, who had opposed the relocation from the beginning and had even taken it to court.

The temporary relocation of the market to the Baix Guinardó Gardens had become a major issue in the neighborhood. The need for a complete renovation of the building that currently houses the Estrella market—which dates back to 1957 and has "structural deficiencies"—forced the City Council to find an alternative space to house it while the work was underway. The decision to place it in this green space between Marina, Lepant, Travessera de Gràcia, and Taxdirt streets angered the residents, who filed a lawsuit requesting a preliminary injunction to suspend the relocation. A request that, after months, the court has now dismissed.

The court's decision opened the door for the City Council to begin the work to relocate the market immediately. However, the council has abandoned this plan. The reason? After years of decline, the market's current precarious situation—with only 19 stalls open—allows for the building's renovation while maintaining its commercial activity. That is, without relocating the stallholders to a new site, but simply placing them all on the ground floor. According to the City Council, these stallholders unanimously voted to begin the work "as soon as possible."

Now the City Council has begun working on this new renovation project for the Mercado de la Estrella, about which it has not yet released any further details. Nor is there any information on whether the city council will incur any costs for cancelling the construction of the temporary market in the Baix Guinardó Gardens, a project awarded last June for €6.53 million.

The entities welcome the agreement

The district councilor, Sara Belbeida, celebrated being able to offer this alternative. "The possibility that has opened up to approach the market renovation project in a different way is an opportunity we didn't want to miss, not only to close this chapter, but also to open a new stage of dialogue and coexistence," she stated. The Baix Guinardó residents' association and the Salvem el Parc and Salvem el Guinardó platforms also celebrated the news.

This puts an end to a controversy that has lasted for years and threatened to become a major headache for the City Council. Not only because of the ongoing administrative litigation, but also because, as explained the NOWAnother citizen complaint had arrived at the City Hall's ethics mailbox, alerting authorities to potential irregularities in the contracting process for the construction of the temporary market over the park's lake. Specifically, the complaint concerned the project's environmental impact assessment.