In Barcelona, there are more than 5,300 empty street-level commercial premises. This represents a total of 1.5 million square meters available. The pandemic has exaggerated this reality, especially in the most central streets, previously massively and exclusively populated by tourists. Walking through Ciutat Vella becomes a continuous route of lowered shutters. Adding the excessive rental prices, the arrival of new businesses to these ground floors becomes even more complicated, especially in times of crisis like the current one.
Taking into account all these factors, the Barcelona City Council has launched the Amunt persianes plan, made up of a set of policies that aim to start reversing this situation. As is done with social housing, the council wants to make affordable premises available to entrepreneurs and self-employed individuals, with the aim of boosting and diversifying the commercial activity of the area. It also aims to encourage businesses located on upper floors to move to street level.
Firstly, it will buy between 30 and 60 empty commercial ground floors, which will serve to create a public portfolio of premises. Thanks to the agreement to approve the budgets with ERC, it will allocate a total of 16 million euros to acquire them through a public purchase procedure, in competition, and based on the offers presented by the owners. That is, it will act as a public real estate agency, as defined by the Councilor for Presidency, Jordi Martí. The purchase procedure will be launched in the coming months and offers will be evaluated based on criteria such as the proposed price, the state of conservation, or its location.
The premises bought by the City Council will have to be rehabilitated, with the forecast of being able to award them, also by competition, by next year. Prices will be offered below market price and there will be two types of contracts, long-term or short-term. The latter will be destined for pilot stores, which will serve to test business ideas and see if they work.
Likewise, the council will launch a rental exchange for ground-floor premises, just as there is currently a rental housing exchange. It will be created in collaboration with operators in the real estate sector and it is expected to add between 100 and 200 commercial ground floors that have no activity. They will also be offered below market price and with incentives for owners, such as insurance to cover non-payments.
Other initiatives that will be promoted include the approval of new lines of economic aid to set up businesses in ground-floor premises, with a budget of 700,000 euros and the forecast of mobilizing between 170 and 200 vacant premises, and the creation of an observatory for this type of premises, which will serve to conduct studies and evaluate the impact of municipal action. With the different policies, the council estimates that it will be able to fill about 600 premises, said the Councilor for Commerce, Montserrat Ballarín.