Disappointment among businessmen, political anger and social indifference. This is how the agreement between the Defender of the America’s Cup, Team New Zealand, and the Catalan institutions has been welcomed in Valencia so that the next edition of the tournament will be held in Barcelona in 2024 and not on the regatta course on the beach of la Malvarrosa, in which the 32nd and 33rd editions of this trophy were played and to which they could have returned if the Generalitat Valenciana and the city council of the capital had not considered excessive the 200 million euros that had to be put on the table so that the Hundred Guineas Cup will return in two years.
The current champions wanted to repeat in Valencia, and they approached the Real Club Náutico, applicant for the 2007 competition and its sequel in 2010, to pull the necessary strings. But the city and its institutions are no longer the same as those years of opulence in which the money from the real estate bubble shone and any project of national or international importance was welcomed and promoted. under the batons of Eduardo Zaplana, Francisco Camps and Rita Barberá.
As soon as Valencia’s options came to light, a good part of the business community came out in its defense, with statements of support, but the mayor, Joan Ribó, made it clear from the outset that the city would provide the facilities created between 2003 and 2007 for the Cup and that it would not put money. And the Generalitat, chaired by Ximo Puig, received the ambassadors and let them know that they would support the event if it represented a “reasonable” cost. But all those gathered knew that the parties of the Pacte del Botànic (PSPV-PSOE, Compromís and Unides Podem) were far from returning to the path of “big events & rdquor; that the PP traveled in the first decade of the millennium due to its differences with that economic and tourist model as for the trail of corruption and debts that he left behind.
ideological prejudices
The popular ones are the only ones who today publicly criticize the march of the Cup to Barcelona and accuse the Consell and the city council of giving up the competition due to ideological prejudices. The Valencian government representatives wish Barcelona luck and breathe a sigh of relief, adding in the crowds that if the event were as profitable as its promoters and defenders point out, there would have been no shortage of local and national businessmen to promote Valencia’s candidacy. In fact, this had already been ruled out since two weeks ago the New Zealand union announced that centered its negotiations in Malaga, seeing that his attempt would not materialize in the capital of the Turia.
A report by the Valencian Institute of Economic Research estimated the total impact of the Cup on the income (added value) of the Valencian Community at 2,724 million euros
And that the America’s Cup that Valencia captured in 2003 in a public auction called by the millionaire Ernesto Bertarelli and his Swiss union (without sea) Alinghi is recognized economically and socially as the best and most profitable event of those that landed in the city in the golden age, by contrast, for example, with the disastrous F-1 1 on a street circuit. A report by the Valencian Institute of Economic Research (IVIE), the same one that today supports Ximo Puig’s claims on regional financing with its work and analysis, estimated the total impact of the Cup on income (added value) at 2,724 million euros. of the Valencian Community, while in terms of production (output) the figure reached 5,748 million. The employment generated or maintained amounted to 73,859 jobs, all referring to the period between 2004 and 2007, the year in which the first of the two Valencia disputes ended.
74% for infrastructure
Of the 2,768 million euros spent on the preparations and development of the 32nd America’s Cup, 74% was allocated to the creation of infrastructure to accommodate the participating teams (11 challengers plus the Alinghi defender) and to the needs of the event. Rodríguez Zapatero’s government granted 500 million euros for the works, but as credit, not sunk as he had done with other cities in similar scenarios, which gave ammunition to the PP for years. The bulk of that debt, 340 million, has been forgiven in recent months by the Government of Pedro Sánchez.
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With the money available, València converted the inner dock of its port into the competition venue, with the teams’ bases in a semicircle on the docks; opened a direct channel to the north so as not to share the exit with the merchants of the commercial port; built a pontoon for mega yachts and erected the unique Veles e Vents building, by the British architect David Chipperfield, as the official venue for the regattas. This space, initially named Marina Real Juan Carlos I, later renamed Marina de València, today hosts new uses but maintains its sports equipment structure and offers some 700 moorings and outstanding proposals for gastronomy and leisure.
The passage of the America’s Cup sailing through Valencia not only left a marina. The capital was opened to tourism from the United States, until then absent, thanks to a competition that has a good following there, and the presence of Italian visitors increased after the claim of three transalpine teams haggling against Malvarrosa. The manhole covers with the image of the Cup of the Hundred Guineas are today mute memories of that formula 1 of the sea that has headed north.