Local residents were aghast on Wednesday when a team of workmen from the Orihuela Ayuntamiento, turned up, without any prior notification, and began to close the 100 metres of paseo linking Aguamarina with Cabo Roig.
According to a council spokesman the paseo was closed following a sentence imposed by the Supreme Courts, ordering the gates closing it to all but residents of BellaVista Urbanisation, be reinstated, with a deadline of 15 December.
The closure will now reintroduce a 3 kilometre diversion for any pedestrian wishing to walk from Aguamarina to Cabo Roig or beyond, many thousands of tourists and residents alike, particularly during the holiday periods.
Related: OPINION: The botch-up of Aguamarina
Despite being contacted by The Leader Newspaper, beyond the short 2 line statement stating that the walkway was being closed because of a judicial order, the council have failed to respond.
The dispute between the residents of Bella Vista Urbanisation and the Ayuntamiento, relates to a 35 year battle over the Paseo de Cabo Roig, the 100 yard stretch of coastal walkway that runs along the front of the BellaVista Urbanisation, between Aguamarina La Caleta and Cabo Roig Beach.
Having initially been declared illegal by both the Administrative Court in Elche and the High Court of Justice, the wall shutting off access was pulled down by municipal staff in March 2015. As he presided over the demolition, Antonio Zapata, Orihuela Councillor for Planning at the time, declared that opening the paseo was long overdue, but what he didn’t reckon on was the resolve of the Bellavista Residents Association.
Led by Community President Brian Honess, Bellavista then went back to the courts where they proved to the Judge, Mr Salvador Bellmont Lorente, and to the courts, that the walkway directly along the seawall and in front of the urbanisation has always been private land, and they were completely within their rights to section it off from access to the general public.
They argued that the original walkway was actually located at the bottom of the cliff face and not along the top of the urbanisation, as stated by Zapata. The judge had no hesitation in finding with the Residents and he immediately ordered that the wall sealing off the paseo be reinstated.
Although the Orihuela Council then had 15 days to appeal, the judgement papers festered in a council drawer, and it seems as though the deadline was allowed to pass with no one in authority being briefed as to the court decision.
Former PSOE Councillor, Zapata, said that “the incompetence, neglect and lack of management by Councillors Almagro and Alvarez meant that at the time the council had lost the right to appeal to the Supreme Court.” He added that he still felt “there were more than sufficient arguments as the pathway fell within the protection of the coastal authority.”
Cllr Almagro subsequently issued a press release stating he felt that opening the walkway between Aguamarina and Cabo Roig had been a huge mistake. He further clarified that following the Appeal Court Decision, discussions were held between the Provincial Directorate of Coasts and the solicitor who brought the case, Pau Agulló, to assess the judgment following which it was felt that yet another appeal would just add more expense for the city with there being little likelihood of the judgement being overturned.
But of course the question now is where do we go from here? With the wall reinstated and Orihuela councillors shifting the blame wherever they can it seems that once again the elected representatives are failing to serve the public interest of those that they represent and the jewel that was once Cabo Roig is now just a murky piece of stained glass!
