The City Council of Girona maintains contact with the property owner of the occupied block at number 13 and 15 of Ferran Puig roundabout so that it assumes the demolition of the building, a property outside of planning due to its proximity to the train tracks and that has been occupied since the summer of 2024.
The council places the focus on the ownership of the property, to which it has already required the cleaning of the space, although until now it has not been executed. The building had remained empty for forty years and on the facade nets were installed to prevent detachments of materials towards the sidewalk.
A building outside of regulation next to the tracks
The urbanistic situation of the property is marked by the General Plan of 2002, which leaves the property out of order due to its proximity to the railway line. The municipal forecast involves intervening on this point with a new building configuration.
"Reconfigure the current buildability" maintaining the number of floors but "a little more set back" - Sergi Font, deputy mayor and councilor for Ecological Transition and Urban Area
That approach would allow to preserve the residential volume, although with a setback regarding the current situation of the block. The demolition of the existing building appears as the previous step that the City Council wants the property owner to assume.
Neighborhood complaints and sanitation problems
The concern in the surroundings has intensified due to the conditions of the property and due to the problems reported for months by the neighbors. Among the complaints are the discharge of sewage through a pipe in the interior patio and the throwing of waste bags.
The council admits that it is looking for a housing alternative for vulnerable families who reside in the block, understanding that it is an unhealthy space and that it does not meet the conditions required for a dwelling.
"The neighbors ask to be in a quiet neighborhood and live in peace" - Sergi Font, Deputy Mayor and Councilor for Transición Ecológica y Área Urbana
Partial evictions and return of occupants
Another of the problems that the property drags is the difficulty to empty it completely. The eviction processes carried out until now have not been total and, once the police forces withdraw, the occupants return to access the flats.
The municipal head of Ecological Transition and Urban Area also maintains that the building acts as "refuge for other types of people" who use it as protection to commit crimes, a circumstance that adds pressure to an entrenched situation at this point of the Ferran Puig ring road.
While the action on the property is not materialized, the City Council insists on combining the demand on the property owner to act on the building with the search for a solution for vulnerable families, in a block that has been empty for four decades and occupied since last summer and that has become one of the main sources of neighborhood conflict in the area.