Barcelona is undergoing a profound transformation. It has been a year to remember in 2026, with major events, new projects and infrastructure, and a growing international profile. Some even say the city has begun to recover its self-esteem this year. But Barcelona is also grappling with challenges such as housing, insecurity and inequality, which strain the lives of many residents and generate unease. How do we manage success so that Barcelona remains a city to live in, a city for its people?
Barcelona's mayor, Jaume Collboni, receives us at Barcelona City Hall, in the Saló de Cent. Collboni has been mayor of Barcelona since June 2023. Before that, he served as first deputy mayor and spokesperson for the municipal government, having built much of his political career in the Parliament of Catalonia and the PSC. With the next municipal elections set for Sunday, 23 May 2027, Collboni is now entering the final stretch of his first term as mayor. Three years after taking office, there is enough perspective to start seeing what has changed, what his main priorities are, and which challenges remain unresolved.
– Mayor, thank you for having us. What is the price of Barcelona’s success?
– For me, success, as the city’s mayor, and I think it is also the case for many Barcelona residents, is for Barcelona to have, for example, a network of more than 500 public facilities spread across its 73 neighbourhoods. Success is having 43 public libraries. Success is having 40 municipal markets that guarantee the supply of fresh, locally sourced food throughout the city. Success is also having around 40 public sports centres that make Barcelona one of the cities in the world with the highest levels of participation in sport. For me, all of these ideas contribute to Barcelona’s success.
– Success also lies in the wellbeing of residents. And a good gauge of that wellbeing is the municipal barometer. How do you assess the latest results?
– Well, I think the real challenge behind the success you're asking about is keeping the city attractive — for investment or international talent, for instance — without that coming at the expense of the city's identity, and ensuring that the economic growth reflected in the barometer is distributed fairly, with quality jobs created for the people who live here.
In this sense, the assessment made by residents in municipal barometers and in the surveys that have been published over these last three years is that the management of the City Council is approved of and supported by a large majority.
– It gets a 6 out of 10.
– Exactly. And that's asking how the metro runs, how the bus runs, the local library, the market, public space. People appreciate that the council is doing important work to ensure the quality of public services.
And I believe that this is what most unifies a city: feeling that the city protects you, that the city gives you the services you need, and that these services are close to home. This is the great success of the city and, indeed, citizens appreciate and value this, although, obviously, we have problems and challenges that we must face collectively.
– In fact, in the municipal barometer, residents approve of the council's management but flag several concerns. Housing comes first and insecurity second, although the gap between them is narrowing. How do you read these perceptions?
– To begin with, residents' concerns are our concerns too. And on both fronts — housing and security — there has been progress; the work of the past three years has produced good results.
Regarding housing and thanks to the application of the regulation of rent price caps, we are the only large city in the country that has stopped the rise in rental prices. In fact, it has fallen by 5% in the last two years. It is true that it is still at very high levels, but if we had not applied these caps, today the rental price in the city would probably be €300 or €400 on average more expensive.
And from a security point of view, although I am aware of many people's concern, the truth is that we have also had two years of continuous decline in crimes. Repeat offending is steadily decreasing and we've also enabled greater judicial and police action, which is helping resolve part of the problem
These are not things that are resolved in a day — I think everyone understands that; the housing problem is so big and so global that it will not be resolved in one term, nor probably in two — but we can say today that we're building twice as much social housing as three years ago. We can say today that, adding up the fall in petty crime across the city, we're down almost 35% cumulatively. We are going in the right direction.
– Let's talk about housing. You mentioned you've managed to control housing prices, but the sector still suffers from a shortage of available supply. There are fewer and fewer apartments on the market.
– That is not entirely true.
– That's what real estate agencies say...
– Well, of course. Here everyone explains it as they see fit… Our long-term and medium-term goal in the city is to guarantee the right to stay in the city. And that means, to begin with, building affordable housing, regulating and building more social housing. And that is what we are doing. This year, we will deliver 1,000 homes, next year 1,200, and we will double the previous average...
– The goal is to reach 15,000 by 2027 according to Plan Viure.
– Indeed. We want to reach 15,000 homes to increase the social housing stock, and also boost the private market. And on that front, we have two good visual examples: two new neighbourhoods currently under construction in Barcelona — La Marina del Prat Vermell and La Sagrera. In La Marina del Prat Vermell, a neighbourhood of almost 10,000 new homes is being built. And while the cranes aren't all visible yet — some are — in the Sant Andreu area, around the new Sagrera station, roughly 3,000 new homes are already under construction. Between these two areas alone, public and private combined, more than 25,000 homes have already begun construction. There's light at the end of the tunnel.
“Tourist apartment licences should never have been granted”
– Before your term ends, how many social housing units will be ready to hand over the keys to?
– We'll have delivered around 3,000, with 5,000 under construction and, with land already prepared, a further 10,000 in the pipeline. And, crucially, another 10,000 all at once in 2028, when we don't renew tourist-flat licences. We'll be the first city in the world to do this, because we believe tourist flats are undermining or damaging the right to housing. Returning 10,000 tourist flats to residential use is roughly equivalent to a decade's worth of housing construction in Barcelona.
– Well, because little has been built in recent years.
– Yes, little has been built both by the public and private sectors.
– In the private sector's case, is that because of the requirement to reserve 30% of new developments for subsidised housing?
– And because the 2008 crisis hit the property sector hard and halted construction, and the sector took a long time to recover. Also, because Barcelona doesn't have much land; we're a city of 101 km² with little room to grow. But we're doing it now. And we're pursuing several other strategies too, such as renovation.
– And converting offices into housing?
– That too. These are other strategies we're following, alongside removing tourist flats, as part of the Plan Viure. Like the debate that's opened up around converting ground-floor commercial premises into housing. There's still room for supply to grow in the city, and across the wider metropolitan area too. Improving public transport matters here as well...
“Flats are for living in”
– Let's go back to tourist apartments. Will eliminating tourist apartment licences solve the housing problem?
– It will contribute a lot. 10,000 homes for residential use means 25,000 people who can stay and live in Barcelona. 10,000 homes that return to residential use is the equivalent, as I told you before, of a decade of new housing construction. It will also help solve coexistence problems both for homeowner communities and in some neighbourhoods, and it will also be noticed in terms of the city's identity.
That's why we have fought this very important battle in Brussels. And we've taken a major step forward with the approval of the European Affordable Housing Plan, because we want to safeguard this path we've started and make sure there's no turning back.
– On the coexistence problem: if Barcelona's tourist flats were concentrated in dedicated buildings, all together, rather than bothering the neighbour on the same landing, would it be less of a serious problem for Barcelona?
– It would be less serious, but our starting point is that the most important part of our decision to scrap tourist flats is that flats are for living in. If it's a house, residential use should take priority in a housing emergency like the one Barcelona is experiencing. So, any flat not being used as a home is something the council must, within its powers, try to turn back into a place to live.
“When a public policy does not yield the result you are looking for, you have to change it”
– But if the housing emergency is resolved, could licences be reconsidered down the line? Perhaps too many were granted at the time?
– My view is that tourist-flat licences should never have been granted in the first place. That's what hotels, guesthouses and youth hostels are for.
– Let's look at another measure: the requirement to reserve 30% of new-build housing in Barcelona for subsidised housing, which has resulted in very few new flats and even fewer social housing units. Should this regulation be revised?
– Yes. I am very clear and very practical about this: when a public policy does not yield the result you are looking for, you have to change it.
– And it hasn't delivered.
– No, it hasn't, or only very minimally. And we backed it, like most of the groups currently on the council, because the intention behind it is good. Reserving 30% of new developments for affordable housing is a good idea in principle.
– Has it failed because it relies too much on private capital?
– No, the problem is that, as the rule currently stands, it forces the reserved units to be built within the same building, which discourages developers. Developers don't see a clear upside for various reasons, so they don't build. And we've got a lot of frozen investment as a result. What we're proposing is to take that 30% and apply it instead to entire affordable-housing buildings — pooling it into affordable-housing developments.
– But doesn't that mean a developer needs to have several developments on the go...
– No. For example, if I build a development of 10 private homes and have to reserve three for social housing, those three don't need to be within that same development. They could instead be built in a separate, publicly owned building.
– But who owns that building?
– The public sector.
– So, the costs are paid by the private developer, but in a publicly owned building.
– Exactly. This is what is done in many European cities. It's called offsetting the 30%.
– And what does the sector say?
– The sector is in favour. The problem is that, for political reasons, we haven't been able to build a sufficient majority on the council at the moment, but I don't want to get into political disputes. I think the proposed arrangement was very reasonable.
– Are you considering lowering that 30% to 20%?
– No, because it's an amount the private sector was already willing to commit and offset towards affordable housing developments.
– Let's talk about inequality. Barcelona is a culturally and economically wealthy city, but it has stark inequalities; strong socioeconomic differences between neighbourhoods. How does the council identify these inequalities?
– First, the first way to fight against poverty and inequalities is to generate wealth. That means having a functioning economy, businesses doing well, businesses hiring, and companies in sectors that pay good wages. Fortunately, that's happening in Barcelona.
One of Barcelona's successes is that we currently have a very low unemployment rate. There is some, but it's minimal. That's why people come to the city to work, why talent arrives from major multinationals, engineers and scientists, and people from the services or hospitality sectors — because the city's economy is growing.
What should the administration do? Guarantee that everyone receives the same public services on equal terms. And Barcelona is a city where every neighbourhood — or somewhere very close to everyone's home — has a library, a primary healthcare centre, a municipal market, a metro stop, a bus service. That's the first guarantee of a city's cohesion.
– The 15-minute city.
– Not so that someone living on the right side of Eixample, or in Sant Andreu de Palomar, or in Navas, has different services from those in Eixample Esquerra or Sant Gervasi. In other words, equalising services for everyone. That's the idea behind a social-democratic city: one that grows and backs the economy, but distributes that growth through services on equal terms for all its residents.
However, of the inequalities that exist in the city, the one that worries me most and is most difficult to resolve is child poverty. It is poverty of origin, often from migrant families, for whom we strive to ensure that from the beginning, from nursery school, they have the same opportunities to escape situations of poverty or chronic inequality. This is where we put our focus, especially in the Neighbourhood Plan, which is a plan that also distributes almost €400 million across Barcelona's 27 most vulnerable neighbourhoods.
– I wanted to ask you precisely about three indicators for detecting inequalities in the city. You mention one, which is child poverty. What other two indicators could we identify?
– The school dropout rate. When a child leaves school early, it's usually down to social and economic reasons. Fortunately, we're seeing improvements here thanks to the neighbourhood plans we're applying, particularly around education. And then there's income inequality, obviously, though the council has less scope to act there. What we can work on more is everyday, practical equality.
– Access to services and infrastructure.
– Sport, for example. We invest €15 million a year in sports scholarships so that every child in the city can take part in extracurricular sports activities.
We also provide aid with the Guaranteed Minimum Child Income, a kind of voucher that guarantees food and school supplies for the most vulnerable families. We are the first city in the State to implement it.
We've been taking rebalancing measures so that this city's prosperity is shared. In a city that hosts conferences and attracts major corporate investment announcements — and it's good that it does, and should continue to — we don't want anyone left behind.
– Let's talk about major transformations. The superblocks have just marked their tenth anniversary in Barcelona. What's your assessment, ten years on?
– Superblocks have been around for much longer.
– But the first one?
– Absolutely. The first was Portal de l'Àngel. The next was Avinguda de Gaudí. And then came the superblocks, which weren't called that then, which were the pacifications made in Vila de Gràcia, Sant Andreu, Sants, in the Sarrià area. In other words, the historic villages that make up Barcelona were really the first great superblocks, because they were pacified areas where human scale mattered more than the car, which had taken up a great deal of space in these villages.
That said, what's known as the Consell de Cent superblock is, I think, the first to intervene directly and horizontally in the Cerdà grid — since the diagonals had already seen intervention, with Avinguda de Gaudí — and that produces a disruption to mobility...
– And some resistance.
– And therefore, some resistance. We've tried not to turn these traffic-calming processes into conflicts — in Meridiana, for instance. We've tried, and I think managed, to hold a dialogue with all the sectors affected, because these schemes often leave some people worse off, or at the very least forced to change their travel habits, or affect shops in the area...
My conclusion is that we've learned something from every stage of traffic-calming the city has carried out over the past 30 or 40 years. And I think the great lesson from Consell de Cent, which has turned out to be a magnificent piece of work that many people now enjoy, comes down to two things above all. The first is whether we've genuinely reduced overall traffic in Eixample — and the data tells us we haven't, really, because it's simply shifted onto other streets.
– And it has caused greater congestion in these streets.
– That's right, and that was not the objective. And another effect that we will also have to keep very much in mind for future traffic-calming schemes is the impact on housing prices.
– Right, because when we improve the city, or specific areas of it, what ends up happening is that area becomes more expensive, and in the next cycle the very people we wanted to help can no longer afford to live there.
– Indeed. And I admit that this is a paradox.
– An urban-planning paradox.
– One I don't yet have an answer or a clear solution to. I'm simply pointing out that there's a paradox here that the whole city still needs to work through together, because the goal was certainly never to push people out, or force people to sell their flats because they'd suddenly become worth a lot of money.
– So that question is still unresolved, but the mobility one isn't, is it? It's clear that congestion has built up in the surrounding streets. Is that being factored into current traffic-calming schemes?
– Every traffic-calming project has an impact on mobility. In Meridiana, which we're finishing now, almost 5 km long, we've turned one of the city's main entry arteries into what will become a boulevard. Or the pedestrianisation of Las Ramblas, which we hope to open in February, which cuts mobility significantly and leaves the street mostly for goods deliveries and public transport.
So, the plan is to have public transport capacity that can absorb what we're taking away from private vehicles. Private transport will always exist, and I won't wage any war against it, because someone who works at an industrial estate in the Baix Llobregat and has to get up at 4 a.m. because their shift starts at 5, sometimes has no alternative but to take the car. We have to bear that in mind. We can't pretend, or assume, that they'll ever stop using it. But this is where investing more in the metro comes in, which we are doing, and where the debate over Rodalies comes in too, which affects us particularly, and which I hope improves considerably in the coming years.
– I'll make a big jump, since we're short on time, from the Rodalies debate to the debate over airport expansion. What kind of airport does Barcelona need?
– More connected. We need to be more connected, especially with the United States and Asia. And that means having more direct flights so that investments and higher value-added companies can arrive. Because if we want better jobs in Barcelona, we need people who create companies in these areas of the world to be able to connect directly with Barcelona. And from a tourism perspective too: the kind of tourism we're after for Barcelona — not more tourism, but better tourism — is the kind that also comes from the United States and Asia. So, the more direct connections we have, the more likely we are to attract that kind of visitor.
“Barcelona no longer needs major events, either to promote itself or to drive major transformation projects"
– What return does Barcelona expect, or seek, from major international events it hosts, such as the Pope's visit or the Tour de France?
– The Pope's visit was an institutional one; it wasn't something we planned...
– An institutional visit with significant public expenditure...
– Of course — if the head of the Catholic Church, the majority church in our country, comes to inaugurate the completion of a work as iconic and emblematic as the Sagrada Família, then the city, the state, and Catalonia need to put the resources in place to make it run smoothly. And it worked perfectly, as everyone could see.
– We know the cost. But do we know the return?
– The return isn't purely economic. Neither the Tour nor the Pope's visit led to an increase in visitor numbers, at least according to what hotels have told us.
– We were also already in high season at that time...
– Yes. We were at 90-something percent occupancy, and that's not what we were looking for either.
With the Sagrada Família, Barcelona experienced a real "wow" moment, seeing the city shine again...
– That self-esteem we mentioned earlier?
– Indeed. And in a way, it reconciled us with the Sagrada Família as the icon of the city that it is.
"We've already reached the limit on the number of tourists in the city"
But it wasn't a visit we'd promoted; it was one we had to host. And as for the Tour, that's one of those major events that sporting bodies often request, and are entitled to propose, and which we take on if we think they're right for the city, and we will again in future. That said, Barcelona no longer needs major events, either to promote itself or to drive major transformation projects.
– No, but it still gets them.
– Which is exactly why we're no longer obliged to chase them. What we do need to look after is our international reputation. We need to make sure the Barcelona we project to the world is a city that offers culture, gastronomy, economic opportunity and safety, and one where tourism keeps functioning well.
That said, we've already said we've reached the limit on the number of tourists the city can handle, which is why we've taken measures like scrapping tourist flats, or the cruise-ship taxation, which comes into force from 1 January, because we want to reduce overtourism and improve the experience for people who come to visit us.
And with conferences too, like Mobile World Congress: the people who come aren't just visitors to us, they're people making decisions within their companies, and their visits have often led to companies setting up in Barcelona, which then creates quality jobs in the city.
– A small personal question to finish: you've dedicated much of your career to politics — quite a few years now. What's left of that younger Jaume Collboni?
– What's left? Everything. In fact, I was doing politics before I entered politics. I've been in politics for as long as I can remember. Since I was 13, when I became a student council representative at my school, because I wanted to improve the education system and improve my school, here in the Fort Pienc neighbourhood. That was my first responsibility, and I've been doing politics ever since.
I joined a political party much later, though; I've been dedicated to politics as such for the past 10 years. I've always had a political commitment, and when I stop being mayor, I'll probably still have one.
– The way politics is done has changed a great deal over these years and so has the way it's communicated. Today many politicians are content creators on social media, and highly professionalised ones at that. What do we gain and what do we lose with this way of doing politics?
– I think it's about adapting. When I started out in politics, or when I ran campaigns at university, there was no internet; it was all posters and direct contact. So, it's about adapting, without going overboard, and without falling into the trap of constant communication and noise. In fact, I think we've also learned to distance ourselves from the noise of social media, which is very important.
"I want to leave a better Barcelona, and a Barcelona that guarantees people the right to stay"
– Not answering everything, not getting drawn into everything?
– No, because our work requires focus and reflection. So, I don't live glued to social media, far from it. In fact, I don't even have it on my phone. But I understand it's an important channel for reaching a lot of people, especially Instagram, because I gave up Twitter, as I consider it's become an utterly toxic place, manipulated by a man with very perverse intentions. And I'm sure I lose opportunities by not being there, but I think we also have to make decisions like that.
– The municipal elections are just around the corner. What kind of Barcelona do you want to leave behind?
– A better Barcelona, and a Barcelona that guarantees people the right to stay. That's the intention I had when I first got involved in political life and in the City Council, many years ago.
I'm very pleased with the progress and the changes we've made, and with the results we've discussed: on housing, security, public space and the city's transformation. I'm glad to say we've brought back major transformation projects in the city, which is what gives us great opportunities — like the new La Sagrera station or the new La Marina neighbourhood; I'm particularly proud of those. And also the smaller works that might be a bit of a nuisance but are necessary — improving the sewer system to cope with rainfall, more sustainable street lighting, better public space that's more adapted to climate change...
This is the Barcelona we want, and above all, the Barcelona we deserve.
– Thank you, Mayor.
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