After spending the entire legislature attacking central Madrid, Ortega Smith now joins the left against the arboricide of the Metro works and is left alone voting against the felling of the Adif works
Vox has sponsored a new flag at the Madrid City Hall. After taking the entire legislature criticizing the environmental policy of the municipal government and the adaptation of the PP of central Madrid and attacking the left for its ideas in defense of sustainable mobility, it now stands as a green party in defense of the city’s trees. The councilors of Javier Ortega Smith’s group have joined the rest of the opposition parties to request that the felling of trees be stopped for the expansion works of Metro line 11 and have voted against the authorization of felling for the works of the Atocha station and other neighborhoods of the city.
Those of Ortega Smith thus wave a new banner against José Luis Martínez Almeida, whom they have no intention of giving truce until the elections. In fact, this Wednesday both will meet to supposedly negotiate one of the key initiatives of the legislature, the modification of urban regulationsbut due to the issues that the Vox spokesman has announced that he will put on the table, they also point out that they will serve to wave another flag against the mayor in the coming weeks.
arboricide
He plenary session of the Madrid City Council This Tuesday, he had up to three issues related to Almeida’s green Madrid, two of them focused on the felling of trees as a result of the works managed by the Community of Madrid (Metro line 11) and those managed by the State (related to works of Adif). Vox has chosen to form a common front with Más Madrid, PSOE and the mixed group and urge the Government of Isabel Díaz Ayuso to paralyze the metro works that affect the trees of the Parque de Arganzuela y Comillas, in the surroundings of madrid riverand modify the construction project of a new stop right at the point where these trees are.
The neighborhood protests that have taken place in recent weeks due to the announced disappearance of close to a thousand trees, in any case, have already caused the reversal of the Community of Madrid, which announced almost ten days ago that it was paralyzing the works for the moment, although without explaining what alternative it offers on the route already approved or if it will return to the initial project that located the controversial metro stop in the surrounding streets of Madrid Río, separated from where the trees are.
The other proposal against which Vox has voted againstIn solitary, It has been the one that has brought the municipal team to the plenary session so that the opposition can rule on the felling of 247 trees around Atocha for the construction of the through station and another hundred trees for various Adif works in the city. With this proposal, the municipal government intended to expose the left-wing groups that protest the “arboricide“that cause the works of the Community of Madrid but not by those that are supported by works managed by the Government of Pedro Sánchez.
Although it was still a staging because the authorization for the felling of these trees was granted months ago to the Ministry of Transport, the Vox councilor Fernando Martinez He has assured that his party does not care that the works are delayed as long as these plants are not removed: “You have to look for alternatives, if the works have to be delayed, let them do it”. This has concluded a brief intervention in which Vox has suddenly been seen defending the protection of trees and the alternative plan for transplants like nobody else in plenary session.
On this occasion, More Madrid, PSOE and mixed group have defended, before the accusations of “postureo” of the delegate of Environment and Mobility, Borja Carabante, or “arboreal populism” that has launched santiago saura (Citizens), that in the case of the Madrid Metro works in the Madrid Río area, there is indeed an “alternative”, that they are against “indiscriminate felling” and that the residents complain because the project that they in progress from the Community supposes a modification of the original location of the project. “It’s just a thick smokescreen to cover up his tree-killing policy”has launched the councilor of More Madrid, Jose Luis Nieto.
new negotiation
ortega smith will stage again this Wednesday if his rejection of the policies of Almeida Is it total and resounding or if it still fits some loophole for the agreement between the two. After requesting a meeting by letter, which they made public last Thursday, both leaders will meet to see if it is possible to negotiate the modification of the urban regulations of the General Urban Planning Plana project that comes out of the Urbanism Delegation of Mariano Fuentesof Citizens, and which is one of the initiatives that the mayor had proposed to approve before the end of the legislature.
Although in June 201 Vox voted in favor of the processing of this project, in December 2022 it joined the left and rejected it against its initial position. This decision has been widely criticized by the city’s real estate business fabric, which, according to different sources, has sent Ortega Smith the message that it will leave many projects up in the air that could generate up to 4,400 jobs in the sector and investments worth 225 million euros.
The mayor goes to the meeting with skepticism but “with an outstretched hand” to reach agreements on matters that are within municipal competence, but not on matters that exceed them. Ortega Smith has made it clear that he will not be able to approve “in principle” any project that is “impregnated” with “ideological overtones” of the left and in the 1,700 pages that it contains, he has assured, there is too much “ideology, gender perspective and agenda 2030” which, in his opinion, do not benefit the urban development of the city. “Clean the urban planning of Madrid from ideological garbage”, has been the message for that meeting on Wednesday.