LokalNachrichten: MADRID (SPANIEN)

[Marc of Frankfurt]

Madrid räumt ebenfalls im Rotlichtviertel auf,
siehe auch die Debatte zu Amsterdam...


Madrid red-light district to chase away prostitution, drugs

MADRID (AFP) — Inspired by London's Soho and Manhattan's Tribeca, a Madrid group is bent on transforming the Spanish capital's red-light district, moving prostitutes and drug dealers out and trendy clothing shops and restaurants in.

The business association set up last year, called AcTriball, has bought or leased property in the central district that was used for brothels or had been abandoned. It rents the sites at affordable rates to modern outlets willing to set up shop in this historic but run-down area.

AcTriball charges only around 20 euros per square metre (about 30 dollars a square foot) for rent, compared to the 200 euros per square metre demanded on the nearby Fuencarral, whose funky stores draw youths from across the capital.

"We want fashionable clothing stores, alternative bars, galleries and concert halls to open," Javier Garcia-Renedo, the director of the real estate consultants Consultores Grove which is working with AcTriball, told AFP.

The old red-light district, a broad stretch of narrow streets with buildings not more than five storeys tall, is now plastered with white signs with bright green lettering making the retail spaces for rent under the scheme.

The goal is to open roughly 100 new outlets, including about 30 in former brothels, said Garcia-Renedo.

Most of the stores now house either sex-shops, small food stalls or boutiques offering cheap long-distance telephone calls aimed at immigrants.

But the scene is already changing. Windows boarded up with bricks or boards and graffiti-covered walls now share the same sidewalk with buildings in bright, freshly painted colors and plants hanging from tiny verandas.

The scheme has the blessing of Madrid's conservative mayor, Alberto Ruiz-Gallardon, who has boosted police patrols and spent 500,000 euros to have video surveillance cameras installed in the area.

Its strategic location holds promise -- just west of Fuencarral street and just north of the Spanish capital's main high street, Gran Via.

Up 4,000 potential customers per hour circulate on the Gran Via, home to huge chain stores like Zara and H&M, said Garcia-Renado who hopes the new "alternative" area will woo both these high street shoppers and the younger crowd from Fuencarral.

Backers of the project point to the example of Soho in central London, which was know for its sex shops and prostitution during most of the last century but is now a main entertainment district.

Many residents, though, believe gentrification will be an uphill battle.

"I have always seen this neighbourhood the way it is now, this is surely not going to change overnight," said Elena, who gave only her first name, who has worked at a local liquor shop for the last 40 years.

"It's not the prostitutes who bother me, it's the drug addicts, it would be better if they weren't there," she said, framed by the dozens of wine bottles that line the shop's window.

Many of the prostitutes who work the streets of the neighbourhood appear reluctant [widerwillig] to leave.

"This project leaves me neither hot nor cold but of course I would rather stay here," said one of a dozen women plying their trade on Desengano street -- which means "disappointment" in Spanish -- on a recent morning.

Not everyone welcomes the project. The president of neighbourhood association ACIBU, Isabel Munoz, has accused the municipal government of neglecting the district and now turning it over to private hands.

"We'll see what they will transform the neighbourhood into and what they will install, because we also don't want it to become a place where all of Madrid comes to consume and the small traditional shops, which give life to the neighbourhood, end up closing," she told top-selling daily newspaper El Pais.

If the plan works, real estate agents estimate the cost of buying a square metre of space in the neighbourhood -- currently between 3,600 and 4,800 euros -- could rise by 20 to 30 percent.

Actriball has already sought to inject new life and draw more than the usual locals by organising events like a marathon through the district's streets and a Christmas market in the main square often used by drug dealers.

The association has even come up with a new name for the district -- "Triball" -- which alludes to fashionable Tribeca in New York , said Garcia-Renedo.

But the sobriquet [Spitzname] is of home-grown inspiration -- a play on both the name of a key local street, Ballesta, and the triangular shape of the neighborhood.

http://afp.google.com/article/ALeqM5iwd ... O3NzWPCs4g





Länderberichte Spanien:
http://sexworker.at/phpBB2/viewtopic.php?t=1308





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[spanien24]

Das ist doch nur wieder etwas für den Presse, denn in Wirklichkeit hat sich im Rotlichtmileu so gut wie gar nichts getan.


EDIT by ZWERG - Links ohne Zusammenhang zur Sexarbeit (SPAM) entfernt EDITENDE