Zaragoza, Mar 28 (EFE).- Almost 150 conservation organizations, scientists, mountain defense platforms and environmental management technicians have signed a manifesto against the union of ski resorts in the Aragonese Pyrenees of Formigal and Astún for cable car through Canal Roya, in which they ask the Government to withdraw European funds for the execution of the project.
A rejection that they express in a manifesto that this Monday has been presented in the registry of the Government of Spain and that of Aragon, as reported by the Platform in Defense of the Mountain of Aragon, in which they defend the need to preserve natural values, cultural, scenic, and intangible objects that the Canal Roya valley houses and express their fear of “irreversible” destruction with the alleged construction of a four-kilometre cable car.
In his opinion, it will immediately generate a large-scale exploitation process of said facility and its accessory roads “at the service of a massive tourism model that can be extended throughout the year” that could include the construction of restaurants or shops “at high points environmental value”, overcrowded hiking routes through places of high fragility or the facilitation and promotion of downhill cycling throughout the valley.
In addition, they express their “serious doubts” about the feasibility of meeting the requirements for the allocation and use of the funds of the Recovery, Transformation and Resilience Plan (PRTR) of the European Union, with which this project is intended to be financed. .
“It seems unlikely that, due to its characteristics, this project can accommodate the fundamental principle of ‘not causing significant harm'” in the mandatory aspects for the allocation of PRTR funds, such as, they recall in the manifesto, the protection and recovery of biodiversity and ecosystems, pollution prevention and control, transition towards a circular economy, protection of water resources or climate change mitigation.
Doubts that are added, in his opinion, to the “low transparency” about the processing and technical characteristics of the project not yet submitted to public information and “virtually unknown”, despite the fact that its promoters affirm that they have already received the corresponding funds .
For the signatories, the project, “irresponsibly defended against all logic by the Aragonese Mountaineering Federation, although rejected by the Spanish Mountaineering and Climbing Sports Federation”, would constitute, if carried out, “an inadmissible precedent, a true accolade for the carrying out any type of inappropriate and destructive project in any mountain area”.
They also highlight that the extraordinary environmental values of Canal Roya earned it the proposal for protection as a Natural Park in 2006, through a decree for the initiation of a Natural Resources Management Plan (PORN), which “unfortunately was never reached.” process” and that now they ask that it be resumed.
The manifesto has been sent to the Vice President of the Government and Minister for the Ecological Transition, Teresa Ribera, to the Minister of Industry and Tourism Reyes Maroto, replaced yesterday by Héctor Gómez, to the Secretaries of State for the Environment and Tourism, to the General Director of Biodiversity at MITECO and the President of Aragon, Javier Lambán, and the President of the Provincial Council of Huesca, Miguel Gracia.