Living in front of a “landfill” in the center of Madrid: noise, stench and rats in Tirso de Molina

At two in the afternoon on a Monday, the containers in the Plaza de Tirso de Molina are overflowing.

The neighbors who come to throw the rubbish tightly squeeze the bags that protrude from the buckets.

Like Roberto Piñeiro, 28, who acknowledges being used to it: "It's always very full, but you're not going to go home with the garbage."

The laziest don't even try.

And they leave, without remorse, the bags on the sidewalk of this enclave, baptized by the neighbors as "the dump" for five years.

The crowding of cardboard boxes, furniture, mattresses and appliances not only causes bad smells and noise, it also welcomes new visitors.

“It's a chore.

We have had to hire a private company to install rat traps for us,” says Danny Muñoz, 42, resigned.

The employee breaks the cardboard boxes with a cutter, a craft that he does daily to get them into the blue container.

Muñoz adds that the filthiest day is Sunday, for El Rastro.

Observing a lady who throws her garbage bag on the pavement, the employee complains about incivility and the problems caused by the accumulation of garbage at the door of his business.

Despite the complaints of the citizens, solving this problem is not in the plans of the Madrid City Council.

“The location they have is where they are least in the way.

There is no alternative”, explains a spokeswoman for the Environment Area.

To which she adds: “Those containers are emptied several times a day and cleaning is done at least six times a day, even up to 10″.

In this square, located in the heart of Madrid, there are twenty shops, five flower shops, nine bars, a theater, a hostel and two supermarkets.

Meiri De Jesús, 58, blames the wholesale stores on the nearby street: “They pile everything up here.

And this is nothing compared to other days.”

Lina Carvajal agrees with her, who has been selling roses and daisies for 16 years.

"There are many shops and in two hours it fills up because there is no space," explains the worker, who admits having had to go to other containers to be able to dispose of her merchandise.

A couple looks at the waste that is outside the containers on Calle de la Magdalena in Madrid, this Monday. Aitor Sol

A lady empties a recycling bag out of the container.Aitor Sol

A young woman tries to put a bag in a container.

Aitor Sol

A man looks at the full recycling bins in Plaza de Tirso De Molina, in Madrid.Aitor Sol

Garbage outside the containers on a street that leads to Tirso de Molina.Aitor Sol

A young man leaves garbage between the recycling containers in the Plaza de Tirso de Molina in Madrid on 06/20/22.

Photographer: Aitor Sol DVD 1112Aitor Sol

Garbage bags in the center of Madrid, this Monday.Aitor Sol

Two men try to leave their rubbish in the full containers in the Plaza de Tirso de Molina. Aitor Sol

The clerk of one of the shops in Plaza de Tirso de Molina breaks the boxes to put them in the recycling container.Aitor Sol

A young woman walks next to a pile of garbage bags in the Madrid neighborhood of Lavapiés, this Monday. Aitor Sol

At three in the afternoon, it seems that the space is recomposed when seeing two cleaning workers arrive with a truck.

But hope lasts a sigh.

Although they collect the garbage accumulated on the sidewalk, they do not empty the containers.

It is a never-ending story for the neighbor Gonzalo García (60 years old, Madrid), who laments the dirtiness of the square: “It is an absolute carelessness”.

It's not the only one.

For five years the daily landscape of the residents of the Plaza de Tirso de Molina has been made up of mountains of rubbish.

Dozens of cardboard, waste bags, mattresses, furniture and appliances accumulate in this Madrid enclave, in front of the number 14 portal. Gonzalo Camarero, 60, lives on the second floor.

“I go into my house and there is shit.

I leave my house and there is shit”, summarizes the indignant resident of the block located in front of the five recycling containers.

The “mammotretos”, as he calls them, were placed in 2017, with the previous mayor, Manuela Carmena.

That same year, the man from Burgos, based in Madrid, opened a Twitter account to denounce the inconvenience caused by the urban landfill on networks, the result of his despair at the immobility of the City Council to his claims.

"Do they call this normal waste from daily activity?" He asks himself ironically at the responses of the Consistory.

Five years later, the new government team of José Luis Martínez-Almeida has not solved the matter either.

The proof is a compilation of photographs posted by the resident from the time they were installed to date.

“How is it possible that they are hitting all morning to scrap a washing machine, a refrigerator or air conditioners?

It's a shame!”, vehemently protests the neighbor, who interrupts the conversation to close the window of his balcony because of the noise.

And he says that he was about to leave his apartment, where he has lived for two decades.

The stench intensifies in summer

"Cataplum! Cataplum!"

This is how he recreates the soundtrack of his daily life: "I spend the whole day listening to the noise of the bottles breaking and the trucks that come to empty the containers."

In addition, he says that cockroaches roam freely and flies fly over the garbage bags arranged on the sidewalk.

With the arrival of the heat that scorches Madrid in summer, the stench intensifies.

“The homeless people who live in the square take advantage of the containers to relieve themselves.

They come here to defecate, to urinate… ”, he explains resignedly.

Although those who live in the Madrid square say that the garbage trucks already pass by at dawn and in the afternoon, they assure that it is not enough.

Ignorance or lack of management?

For Manolo Osuna, president of the neighborhood association La Corrala de Lavapiés, it is a combination of both: "Shops and people leave things there and there comes a time when it becomes a real dump."

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