The flowerbed revolt: Consell de Cent residents replant spaces abandoned by the City Council

BarcelonaThe fight for greenery in the city of Barcelona is being fought street by street and flowerbed by flowerbed. If not, just ask the residents of Consell de Cent, who, two years after seeing their street re-open as a green axis, have now launched a campaign to avoid losing "almost half" of the square meters of plants and trees they had won. Hoe in hand, on Saturday dozens of residents decided to replant the flowerbeds that the City Council had agreed to leave empty due to the difficulties in maintaining them.

The origin of this small hoe revolt lies in the plan that Jaume Collboni's government presented to correct the deficiencies detected in the green axis. Among these deficiencies, the council pointed to the increased costs of maintenance (€315,000 more) and cleaning (€759,000 more) that the calming process had entailed. These figures, however, must be weighed against the increase in greenery and street furniture that calming process entails, as well as its greater use.

The flowerbeds on the seaward side of the street played a role in this additional maintenance cost, being damaged by the impact of loading and unloading vehicles—which often damage the fences protecting the tree pits and flowerbeds—and also by environmental conditions. According to the council, "the flowerbeds are best maintained in areas with good sunlight, such as squares" or the mountain side of the street, which has fewer hours of shade.

For this reason, the City Council explains, it was decided, in agreement with the entities that were part of the green axes improvement plan, to stop replanting those flowerbeds on the sea side—smaller than those in the squares and on the mountain side—where there were no more plants. However, those that were still alive would be kept. This has meant that in recent weeks entire flowerbeds on the stretch of Consell de Cent between Calàbria and Comte Urgell have been completely empty, without a single plant or shrub.

Faced with this situation, the neighbors decided to organize, as they felt that leaving the flowerbeds vacant not only took away a large portion of the greenery from the street, but also meant "wasting thousands of euros invested in creating the flowerbeds and the automatic irrigation system." They disobeyed the City Council and replanted the already empty flowerbeds themselves.

The City Council will not remove them.

On Saturday morning, small groups of neighbors took up gardening tools and, hoe in hand, replanted the empty flowerbeds with loquats, geraniums, ribbons, and asparagus, among other plants. In light of this minor disturbance, municipal sources assure us that they will not remove what the neighbors have planted, and that if the new vegetation manages to establish itself in the flowerbeds on the sea corner of Consell de Cent, it will remain without problems.