EL NIMBYS!
British stars battle plan to put pylons next to luxury Spanish homes
IT IS a sun-drenched spot in southern Spain of such breathtaking beauty that a host of British celebrities have been drawn to make their second homes there.
But with the idyll of the Lecrin valley under threat, the stars of music and film have joined a campaign against plans to install hundreds of ‘monstrous’ pylons.
Among the names campaigners have amassed on their petition are Doctor Who star Peter Capaldi, comedians Rowan Atkinson and Alexei Sayle and songwriter Paul Weller.
Campaigners insist they are not just being El Nimbies and that the 362 pylons, due to be installed by Spanish energy company Red Electrica, will spoil the paradise said to have inspired the writer Virginia Woolf.
They also complain that the power lines, stretching more than 60 miles through the valley and the area known as Alpujarras, will endanger hundreds of protected species, including the rare Bonelli’s eagle.
Genesis star Chris Stewart – the band’s original drummer – also has a home in the valley, along with thousands of British expatriates.
He told The Mail on Sunday: ‘Once again, private financial interests are riding roughshod over the will and the rights of the people, leaving as ever a wake of destruction.’
Describing how he was seduced by the beauty of the valley in his 1999 memoir Driving Over Lemons, Stewart wrote: ‘In the softening light of the afternoon I drove high up and found a spot where I could see the whole valley, green and lovely and apparently inaccessible.’
The valley, just south of Granada in the region of Andalucia, currently attracts hundreds of thousands of tourists each year. And academics from the universities of Cambridge, Granada and Madrid’s King Juan Carlos have estimated losses of almost £14 million a year because of the impact the pylons will have on the tourism industry and local businesses.
Pressure group ‘Di No a las Torres’ (Say No to the pylons) has now presented a petition to the local Spanish authority, with more than 4,000 signatures.
A representative of the campaign told The Mail on Sunday: ‘There is now a huge groundswell of opinion against these monstrous pylons, which will do considerable damage to the area.
‘We are blessed in this part of Spain with beautiful flora and fauna, much of which is likely to be wiped out if these pylons are allowed to be installed.’
The campaigners have also accused the partly stateowned Red Electrica of hiding its proposals for the valley.
They added: ‘Other irregularities include the clandestine nature in which the project has been submitted and their procedure of presenting their plans in a piecemeal fashion throughout the whole of Spain.’
Red Electrica has maintained that its project is ‘the best proposal from both an environmental and a social point of view’.