The aerial image of the Guadarrama River passing through the village of Las Sabinas, between Móstoles and Arroyomolinos, shows several shanties surrounded by tons of garbage.
Since March 2023, when the Móstoles City Council announced the beginning of the end for this village and the relocation of the more than 90 families living there, Las Sabinas has faced several floods, fires, and waste accumulation.
Over two years later, the Arroyomolinos City Council has started demolishing the vacant shanties located in the shantytown nucleus.
The banks of the Guadarrama River turn into a landfill after the floods
Most of these structures are already uninhabited, mainly due to the serious health hazards they face.
Once the shacks are demolished and the families meeting the established criteria are relocated, the Council will render the lands unusable through «all available tools to prevent the construction of new shanties in the future.»
Rain overflows the Guadarrama and puts Las Sabinas on high alert: «This has happened three times already»
The demolition works currently underway represent the first step in a comprehensive plan to create a «safe and orderly natural environment in the heart of the middle course of the Guadarrama River regional park.»
A Problem Lingering Since 2023
In March 2023, the latest relocation agreement for families in the Las Sabinas shantytown, in Arroyomolinos, was published in the Official Gazette of the Community of Madrid. It included the relocation of 90 families from the irregular housing nucleus, completing the work of the 2013 agreement.
New Fire in the Village of Las Sabinas
In the previous action, authorities relocated 54 families after a €12 million investment, leaving only this new agreement pending to provide housing for «another 90 families who could not join the previous one, and whose relocation would allow for complete dismantling.»
The agreement encompassed all necessary actions for the definitive eradication of this village, including the demolition of shanties and the environmental cleanup and conditioning of the area where they are located, on the banks of the Guadarrama River between the municipalities of Arroyomolinos and Móstoles.
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