Linking the revolutions
BARCELONA #15M Newsletter nr 64
BANKS Expropriate Homes.. Neighbours EXPROPRIATE BANKS !
The financial dictatorship that has been in existence across the Spanish State since 2008 has a proper name: the banks. The bailout that the government has given to the banks has been countered by a new wave of occupation in the city of Barcelona: bank occupations.
Currently, there are 7 bank headquarters occupied by residents in downtown Barcelona. The variety of occupations is wide. Some were occupied following a demonstration with music, parades … etc. while others have preferred the anonymity while the occupiers were reforming inside the bank headquarters.
There are a lot of activities within the occupied banks: from free-shops to language schools, sewing or music workshops, documentary screenings, and even urban agriculture.
The opening-up of urban spaces has always been a constant in Barcelona. The particularity of these 7 banks is that the expropriated spaces are transformed to cater for innovative activities. If this proliferation of alternative spaces and enriching activities goes on, it would be achieving one of the greatest challenges of the city of Barcelona: the autonomy of their neighborhoods.
LINKS
All of these expropiated ex banks has a TW account, some of them website, some fb
Banc Expropiat @Banc_Expropiat
Ateneu La Porka @AteneuLaPorka
pea-pod occupied social center
La Vaina @CsoLaVaina
oct 2014.. Tres LLiris (3 Lilies) camp against eviction
Tres Lliris @CPTresLliris
Entrebanc.. the new Carboneria
Entrebanc @lEntrebanc
finishing new mural. oct 2014
Ateneu Popular Fort Pienc @AP_ElRec
Latest figures show that evictions in Spain continue at the rate of 320 every day, the highest ever,in the last 3 months (April-June ’14).
The campaign against, called the PAH is growing fast and has occupied whole blocks of abandoned bank owned property to allocate to homeless families, however there are hundreds of thousands more desperate homeless. http://economia.elpais.com/economia/2014/10/10/vivienda/1412936392_268400.html
ATENEU ROSA DE FOC: BUILDING COMMUNITY AND COOPERATION IN THE HEART OF BARCELONA
Ateneu Rosa de foc is an action and critical thinking space in the heart of the Barcelona’s neighborhood of Gracia. Rosa de foc (Rose of fire) was the name given to the libertarian anarchists in the beginning of XXth century Barcelona, when uprisings often took place in the city. Ateneu is a traditional name for a self-managed center dedicated to specific issues and it also raises social and political involvement in the community. It has a long history with its foundation dating back before the Civil War and some of them were restored after the death of the dictator Franco.
Ateneu Rosa de foc, which recently celebrated its 10th birthday, has been promoting different initiatives in the neighborhood becoming a reference space for critics of the capitalistic and patriarchal system which tries to connect local and global struggles.
Its effort to address social transformation has been giving some positive results: agro-ecological consumption cooperatives (La Tófona and Verduretes), a network for knowledge exchange (XIC), a platform against transgenic products, a library, groups focused on gender, a social kitchen project and more initiatives have been developed in the Ateneu during these years, some of them still exist.
One of the projects born in this Ateneu is the XAINGRA network (network of exchanges in Gracia). As per the people involved in Xaingra, the economy should serve the citizens, to help them to have a better life, not as proven in capitalism but the other way around. For that, the network works online on a daily basis through a mailing list, strengthening the sharing of goods, knowledge and services of all kinds. At the moment it has gained more than 1000 members. Xaingra organizes a face-to-face exchange market with no money involved every three months in which not only products, but also services can be found. It was open from 11am to 7pm.
During the market days, the collective La Olla mòvil (the mobile kitchen) cooks a popular lunch with the food ingredients that people bring. They are trying to promote the use of a social currency, the “gràcies” (which, besides being the name of the neighborhood means “thanks”). Now the Xaingra network is a part of the assembly of the neighborhood and they usually 
meet in the occupied office of the bank known as el banc expropiat (the expropiated bank) which now is under threat of being evicted.
LINKS
Ateneu Rosa de Foc blog [CAT]
Xaingra network [CAT]
Exchange network in Gracia video by Amiconi
STOP THE GENTRIFICATION!
Aturem el pla paral.lel (Let’s block the Parallel project) is the name of a citizenship platform established in Barcelona’s Poble Sec, Raval and Sant Antoni neighborhoods that – its name also being its slogan – wants to stop the City Hall’s new gentrification project.
Lately Barcelona has been suffering a “tourist problem” which means that the city is seeing a huge increase of mass tourism and the risk that the city will become a big theme park is growing radically. But the local government is only interested in making more money through the tourism business which means that the project only serves the interests of private industry. The latter demands it wants to connect the neighborhood with the “strategic” (and strongly overcrowded!) points of the city. The estimated budget for this transformation, which totally ignores the needs and the requests of residents, is 9.6 million euros. Part of this is public money.
The platform strongly asserts that an alternative Pla Paral.lel is possible: a different project, acting against the urbanistic design that facilitates private occupation of public spaces and only serves private profits and commercialization, which negatively affects collective needs and the interests of the majority. Therefore Aturem Pla Paral.lel proposes a project which, taking into account the needs of the people living in the neighborhoods involved must be the result of a participative, democratic and open process.
In particular, they are asking for the immediate interruption to licensing approvals for hotels, hostels and any touristic accommodation such as the permission for bar terraces on streets and squares as well as for the use of public property available in August and in the weekends. It also aims to ban permits for promoting proximity of culture to small local trade and business. Likewise, changes are suggested to the design: rectangular squares at the crossroads to facilitate temporary pedestrianization; better and safer bicycle paths; places with more natural elements; more recreational green spaces… In general, a redefinition of the urban landscape, including less expensive street lighting – the Pla is considering buying hyper-technological lampposts, for a 2.8 millions of euros budget.
- The platform is very active and determined to stop this project. In Barcelona lately other platforms are working to stop the gentrification of its neighborhoods, as Gracia cap on vas? (Gracia where are you going?) located in the Gracia neighborhood. Many platforms settled at the Barceloneta (the harbor neighborhood of Barcelona) joined during last month to protest against the “low-cost and drunken tourists” that crowd the area.
LINKS - Aturem el Pla Paral.lel website [CAT]
- Manifesto Aturem el Pla Paral.lel to sign [CAT]
- Pla Paral.lel: next stop of “Barcelona Brand” [SP]
- Naked Italians spark protests against antics of drunken tourists in Barcelona [EN]What is the Pla Paral-lel? video [CAT]
- Photogallery july demo by @fotomovimiento
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