No Cranes!!!

This may sound hard to believe, but Aguimes, the town on Gran Canaria we’ve been staying in for the past week, is the first place we’ve stayed that didn’t have construction cranes. Every other town we’ve stayed in, and most of those we’ve been to, had cranes. Even tiny Torla, the pueblo of a couple hundred people up in the Pyrenees, had at least two. In some cities, like Madrid, San Sebastián, Barcelona, it’s tough to even count how many. From a high point overlooking San Sebastián, I tried to count, and lost track around 35.

Spain is building like crazy. Much of it is due, we think, to tourism money flowing in, and investors flocking to tourist hot spots to build the next hotel. The southern coast of Gran Canaria is overrun with sprawling hotel resorts. Many areas along the Mediterranean coast are similarly developed.

In the cities, it’s more likely a result of the rural-to-urban migration, something that’s been happening rapidly in Spain for the last 50 years or so. Houses out in the country sit empty, while more and more apartment blocks go up on the outskirts of the big cities. On our train ride out of Madrid, it was incredible to see the northern edge of the city. The urbanization ended, there was a kind of buffer zone of cranes and half-built apartment buildings, then farm fields.

With all this construction going on, we have to wonder how sustainable it all is. The increasing urban population is likely to stay. But the tourism could dry up as quickly as it came, especially if rising fuel costs start forcing people to cut back on flights and long drives.