Camping for Housing

                                                 
In this order they are: the Colón Towers, better known as Los Enchufes; El Mirador de Sanchinarro; El Pocero Bueno

Here's one of my few and far between 'cultural' blogs.  The other day I was reading about the 10 ugliest buildings or monuments in the world and, to my delight or disgust, saw that the Colón Towers (Colón = Columbus) was down at number 6.  Here they're called the 'Enchufes' or 'Plugs' because of that green construction on top which resembles a plug.  Although these aren't the tallest buildings in Madrid, they're tall and are included in the list of skyscrapers.  I'm sure I've already mentioned that buildings in my area are only permitted to go up to five storeys.

Next stop is a building which is part of a new urbanisation in Madrid, which until recently didn't have any type of amenity.  The people who live there had to go outside the neighbourhood to do their shopping, banking, etc..  Our answer to Harrod's got in there quick.though.  Anyway, I think this building was designed by Dutch architects.  I couldn't find a photo of the finished building that I could use unless it would be the Google map one.  This one was taken in 2004 while it was being built.  You can see though that it's constructed with different materials and colours and fortunately the finished product looks better.This building is called the Mirador (lookout) of Sanchinarro because of that big hole in the middle of the building.  When the building was first opened, the public was permitted to go up to this lookout.  Apparently it has a good view of the mountains.  However, people started going there and having picnics and even beer parties, so the Association of Neighbours decided to close it off.  It's a block of flats (apartment building) and therefore not a public building.  The only thing I would like about this building would be the view.  It certainly goes against the norms which are that blocks of flats must be homogeneous. They can't have different architectural designs or materials or windows or anything else that makes one part of the building different from another part.

The last stop is to visit this man.  His name is José Moreno I think though he's called el 'Pocero Bueno' ( a' pocero' is a person that digs for example, wells and sewers).  He's a constructor and has already built a block of flats in which the flats had three or four bedrooms for between 80,000 and 90,000 € (euros).Sorry I don't know the exchange rate at the moment but believe me that is cheap for a flat in Madrid. So when he announced that he was going to build 1,200 more for young people between the ages of 18-35 and people who are divorced (with papers to show they're divorced), you can imagine the excitement and people camping out in the cold for over a week to make sure they get one of those 1,200 flats.  One person who was interviewed on TV was a grandfather who was there on behalf of his grandson.  He must love him very much( or perhaps can't wait to get rid of him) to spend countless hours in the cold.  El Pocero Bueno does this to show that yes housing can be built cheaply and still offer profits to the constructor.  The only catch to this modern-day Robin Hood story is he doesn't have the land to build on - yet. Hope that soon becomes a reality too just to spite all those pessimists out there.

Happy week all.