Tenerife Magazine’s round up of the most interesting news stories of the week in Tenerife.
The streets have been a bit quieter as usual as the Spanish and European ex-pat population (except the Dutch) have taken to performing acts of mass masochism. But whilst the World Cup has dominated the headlines, there have been a few other interesting snippets in the news on Tenerife.
The Train arriving at platform Las Américas will be delayed ““ The South and North Train
Bad news for train-spotters, the current economic crisis in Spain has resulted in the plans to build a light rail network north and south from Santa Cruz being shunted to the sidings. Tenerife’s president, Ricardo Melchior told Television Canaria that instead of being operational in 8 years, it would probably be 10 years before residents could dump the car for the train. Now let’s see, this is Tenerife where a month really means 6 months. By my reckoning that means we can look forward to seeing trains zipping along the coastline sometime around 2030.
Close that stable door ““ Flood Prevention in Costa Adeje
Good to hear that local hoteliers and politicians are drawing up plans to try to prevent a repeat of the chaos caused by torrential rains rushing down from the Barranco del Agua in Adeje. However, cynics may suggest that they should have thought about that before they built a number of hotels below the mouth of a ravine. But there you go, build first, worry about infrastructure later. Of course everyone knows that the weather has been behaving oddly, so how could anyone have predicted the flooding that occurred? Sorry, what was the name of that barranco again?
Stop Scaring the Tourists ““ Heavy Handed Police Checks in Las Américas and Costa Adeje
Business owners in Arona and Adeje complained last week that the police methods used in southern resorts to try to cut down on pickpockets, street vendors and prostitution were scaring the tourists. Listen, you don’t have to be a tourist to be scared mierde-less when surrounded by armed officers who make Jason Statham look like a wuss. Local businesses have called for a more discreet form of policing the area by using plain clothes officers. It sounds sensible enough, but you just know that before long there’ll be some sort of scam. “Allo, allo, allo what do we have here then? I”M fining you €50 for wearing clothes of an offensive nature…” Actually that might not be such a bad idea.
Baby You Can’t Light My Fire ““ Risk of Forest Fires on Tenerife
The Tenerife Government announced that so far this year there had been 1650 fires on Tenerife, but only 1 hectare of land had been lost to fire so far. Personally I’d be happier reading statistics like this at the end of the summer rather than at the end of the winter. But credit where credit’s due, the government is taking positive action to try to prevent serious incidents. Throughout summer there will be 725 employed to tackle incidents; there are also 5 new fire fighting vehicles and 8 watchtowers around the island will be manned 24/7.
The 9th Wonder of the World ““ The South Hospital
It took 22 years to build the Taj Mahal and 20 to build the Great Pyramid in Egypt. On Tenerife we’re still taking bets as to whether the building of the South Hospital near Los Cristianos will take quite as long. For a while it was looking possible, but last week the Canarian Government announced that they have allocated 38 million Euros to complete the project which has been dogged by all sorts of problems. It was only two years ago that it was reported that the building would be completed by 2011. Wisely, this time there were no estimated dates for completion accompanying the announcement…who’ll give me 5-1 on 2015?
Have you heard the one about the Gomero Air Traffic Controller ?
There are all sorts of jokes about La Gomera told on Tenerife, but being the first Spanish airport to operate without air traffic controllers isn’t one of them. From 29th July planes arriving at La Gomera airport will do so with the assistance of AFIS (aerodrome flight information service) rather than air traffic controllers. Funny, that old TV show The Golden Shot just come into my head…right a bit, left a bit. I think I’ll stick to the ferry till I see how it works in practice.
And finally the TIT (This Is Tenerife) of the week award goes to…
Arona and Adeje councils for…doing nothing.
Last week Victor Sanchez, the president of the Association of Businesses in Las Américas and Adeje warned that nightlife in Playa de las Américas and Adeje was dead. He complained that the councils were doing nothing to prevent constant police harassment in bars and restaurants and this was having an impact on the tourists who frequented their premises. He also had local red tape and restrictive laws against music in open air terraces and fiestas on the beach in his sights, saying that it could take up to an incredible 10 years for new businesses to be granted operating licenses.
It’s a crazy situation in two areas which welcome the lion’s share of tourists to Tenerife. The time is long overdue for Adeje and Arona councils to get their fingers out and make life for legitimate business owners easier, not harder in these difficult times.
Call me Nostradamus, but I predict that local councils are going to figure quite a bit in the TIT awards.
