Protesters in the Spanish town of Elche have tried to prevent council workers from eliminating a cycle lane.
The recently elected local government in the Alicante region of south-east Spain, a coalition between the centre-right People’s party and the far-right Vox, has adopted a populist, pro-car policy.
Last week it got rid of the cycle lane in the Avenida Juan Carlos I in Elche at a cost of €38,000 (£32,500) and it has now started work on removing a second cycle lane in Calle José María Buck.
A group of cyclists on Monday blocked part of the José María Buck route during a protest against the removal works.
Claudio Guilabert, the councillor responsible for mobility in the town, told a news conference the work on the Avenida Juan Carlos I was being carried out because parents at the Jesuit school Santa María-Jesuitinas complained they were obliged to double-park outside the school as, like many in Spanish cities, the cycle lane was separated from the road by a line of parked cars.
The council claims the José María Buck bike lane is unsafe for cyclists and pedestrians and has led to 10 minor accidents over 18 months.
Guilabert’s predecessor, Esther Díez, described the plan to create a system in which cyclists would share road space with cars and motorcycles as “barbaric”, claiming the new government was driven by “fanaticism”.
Eliminating cycle routes has proved a popular policy for rightwing governments, starting with the Madrid mayor José Luis Martínez-Almeida in 2019, but it’s not just the right that has discovered that there are votes in a pro-car stance.
In his first act as the mayor of Barcelona, the socialist Jaume Collboni announced that a stretch of the Carrer Pelai that had pedestrianised would be repurposed to meet demand for parking spaces.
Under the previous administration of Ada Colau the city gained a reputation for its efforts to humanise public space. However, backed by local media, Collboni won the mayoral election in May having described Colau as the “anti-car” candidate.
Collboni has said he believes the solution lies in a transition to electric vehicles and has offered citizens €2,500 if they trade their conventional car for a hybrid or electric one, a policy he describes as “a green agenda with a red [socialist] heart”.
