hola mm'ers....
i've been hearing rumours that our friendly mayor man is trying to move his offices into the palacio de communicaciones and therefore it will be shut off to the public.

i love buying stamps there!

anyone have any facts to support this heinous rumour????

say it ain't so!

xoxox c

yes, not a rumor at all, unfortunately it is muy true

his delusions of grandeur made him decide to change the town hall from the plaza de la villa where it has been for over 500 years.

the building is patrimony (owned by) the "ayuntamiento" (town hall) and will soon be "correos" no longer.

they will even have to move the "museo postal y telegráfico" (postal and telegraph museum) which is currently housed in the palacio de comunicaciones.

i do not know where they will put the main post office.

also, someone explain to me why they need a building the size of the palacio de comunicaciones (pic HERE) to house what currently fits into the "casa de la villa" (pic HERE) the former is about 10 times the size of the latter.

ok, the obvious answer would be "to house the mayor's ego"

by the way, the transfer of the town hall will cost 269 millon euros (yes, MILLION, with 6 zeros!).

and they are going to redesign the entire interior of the building antonio palacios (original arquitect) would roll over in his grave).

a few positive things will come out of this move however. the tower of the palacio de comunicaciones will be turned into a "mirador" (lookout) for public use to get a birdseye view of that part of madrid (ARTICLE HERE).

Candela, not sure who told ya it would be closed to the public since actually, a large part of it will be public. there will be space for exhibits where the people of and in madrid can go freely. there will also be auditoriums, etc... for concerts and such.

the old chappel of the palacio may also be used in the future for civil weddings (maybe some of you mm-ers will take advantage of that ).

saludos,
jer...

To the best of my knowledge, in Madrid (in fact, throughout Spain) there seems to be long term value attached to historical preservation. If that is true -how can the powers that be redesign the entire interior of the building without one hell of an uproar?

hey puna.

there has been a lot of discussion about this.

while they must respect and conserve certain "patrimonio histórico" (historical patrimony), it is unclear to what point they will.

many think that since it is the govt., they will "bend" the rules and be "creative" in interpreting them

saludos,
jer...