Barcelona Creates Public Company to Fix Besòs Flats for €415M

Barcelona’s city council gave final approval on Thursday to a public company that will lead the rehabilitation of about four thousand flats in El Besòs i el Maresme, a neighborhood in the east of the city with some of its oldest housing. The company, called Impulsem Futur Besòs-Maresme, is shared between the Ajuntament de Barcelona (city council) and the Generalitat (Catalan government), and the plan puts 415 million euros into the work.

The flats sit in 200 buildings, many of them built in the 50s and 60s and affected by aluminosis (a cement defect that weakens concrete) and other structural problems. About twenty-five thousand people live in the neighborhood.

How the money is split

The Generalitat will contribute 15 million euros a year for ten years, La Vanguardia reported, which other reports put at 150 million euros in total. The city council will put in 265 million euros over the life of the project. About 95 million euros are set aside for the period up to 2029.

Reports differ on the length of the program. La Vanguardia describes a 10-year investment, while Metrópoli Abierta and the PP group spoke of a 12-year period. PP councillor Víctor Martí said the works run until 2038.

When the two governments agreed on the company in May, Mayor Jaume Collboni said the funding would cover between 80 and 100% of the cost of each rehabilitation.

Why it matters for Besòs residents

Progress so far has been slow. Laia Bonet, the first deputy mayor in charge of urban planning, told the council that work has reached 192 flats in four years. At that pace, she said, the city would need more than 40 years to finish. She called the new company a “salto de escala” (a jump in scale).

Bonet blamed the delay on a shortage of homes where families can stay while their building is repaired. When the project began there were two such flats, and there are now 50.

Many owners’ associations in the area cannot afford major structural works on their own, La Vanguardia reported, and neighbors have been asking for solutions for years. The process started in 2020 and has moved more slowly than planned.

The vote and the objections

PSC, Junts, BComú and ERC voted in favor, and PP and Vox abstained. Creating the company was one of the conditions BComú set for backing the city’s 2026 tax bylaws.

Tània Corrons of BComú welcomed the vote but asked the city government to put in writing that the plan will not include demolishing eighteen hundred homes, 45% of the neighborhood. That scenario appeared in the economic plan approved provisionally in October. City sources described it as a technical requirement for this type of company, which must study every option. Bonet said that analyzing a scenario does not mean choosing it and that the city’s goal is to rehabilitate all four thousand flats.

Junts councillor Damià Calvet backed the company after years of what he described as delays and missed deadlines. Eva Baró of ERC said she hoped residents would see results and be able to keep living in the area.

Martí of the PP said the company could be useful but questioned what guarantees residents have that the money will arrive, and he asked how the city will decide which homes come first. Liberto Senderos of Vox called the regeneration urgent but opposed creating a new public company, which he said would carry management costs of 25 million euros without rehabilitating a single home.

Where the plan came from

The Generalitat and the city agreed to set up the joint company in May at a bilateral commission between the two governments. Collboni linked it to his main housing goal, which he described as guaranteeing people’s right to stay in Barcelona. Albert Dalmau, the Catalan minister for the presidency, said the company would help transform the neighborhoods.

Sources: La Vanguardia, Metrópoli Abierta, 20minutos