From your privileged corner in the replica, lourdes lopez is not just a luxury spectator of everything that happens in the Barceloneta -which is not exactly little-, but she is also a kind of (informal) defender of the people. Everyone comes to her stand not just to buy a coupon from her – plus undisputed neighborhood leader, Lourdes is also a salesperson for ONCE-, but to tell her about her sorrows, on many occasions linked to the fact that she had not been able to sleep a wink the night before because of the tourist pressure and nightlife under which the neighborhood lives. “Since February we are in full swing; again. Here there has never been a big break. In February it already started, in Holy Week It was tremendous, and here we continue, terrified of what could happen this summer”, explains the spokeswoman for the neighborhood association L’Ostia from Barcelonetaa neighborhood that this Tuesday has also dawned with the hangover of the Choirs.
“The neighbors of Maritime Front today they say that there were tents and everything on the beach –continues this neighbor-; and the street of Almirall Churruca it’s a hornet’s nest Today at half past five in the morning there was a fight there, three cars of Mossos…”, he continues.
For all this -“bottles, terraces, pedicabs…”, L’Òstia is one of the 30 associations who have joined the Xarxa Veïnal Against Soroll to call a rally Sant Jaume square the next June 16 at seven p.m, “for him right to rest; for a health issue.
The new neighborhood networkand the call, was born in an assembly convened a few weeks ago in the Ateneu Encyclopedic. The origin was the noise commission of the Xarxa Veïnal del Raval, who has been worrying and working on the matter for a long time. “In the neighborhood we have detected three specific phenomena: leisure and bars, large bottles and skateboarding,” he sums up Michael Prats, member of the network and neighbor of the Joaquin Costa street“Where, in 68 numbers we have 34 bars or similar“, complaint.
Looking at the social networks they saw that their problem was shared -with infinite variations- in many other places in Barcelona where resting is a utopia and they began to throw canes: the Poblenou gulf triangle, in Enric Granados, in several Gracia squares… They called a first assembly in the Raval and brought together 25 entities and individual neighbors. A heavy assembly, since everyone really wanted -and often needed- to explain their case, their nightmare, but in which they saw clearly that something had to be done. In the second it was 30.
“Last summer was very hard. We live locked up at home, and there are also a socioeconomic issue. The ones we can afford have double glazed windows and air conditioning, we can lock ourselves up at home and isolate ourselves, but in the Raval there are many neighbors who cannot afford that, and antidepressants, anxiolytics and mental health problems linked to not being able to rest are the order of the day”, reflects Prats.
“Worse than before the pandemic”
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Jordi Badia is another of the neighbors who did not hesitate a second to attend the call for the Xarxa Veïnal del Raval. Lives in Henry Granados, one of the points of the city with highest concentration of terraces. “We have 114 neighboring buildings and 116 terrace licenses”, summarizes this member of the platform SOS Enric Granados, in the eyes of someone who is being “worse than last year” this year. “We have more noise than before the pandemic. New establishments have been opened that already had previously aware licenses. There are sections in which it is brutal. Provence and Majorca. It’s not just the terraces and the people, we already have music bars with night hours that close at three in the morning. When at three in the morning people come out of the premises, you can imagine “, she relates.
“Unacceptable levels”
According to a study by Barcelona Public Health Agency made public last month, 57% of Barcelonans live with unacceptable noise levels. 210,000 Barcelonans (16% of the population) suffer from intense discomfort (severe emotional, psychological and social affectation) and more than 60,000 suffer from a serious sleep disorder due to continuous exposure to traffic noise; Y nightlife is the second great source of noise; for which the Barcelona City Council has created a list of acoustically stressed areas at night: 11 points in the city where the night leisure generate health problems to your neighbors.