An island with palm trees in full
Saavedra
cement .
It is made of plastic, it has slides and bridges, and it crowns the games in a new green space that for decades
had been a bus terminal.
The San Isidro Labrador square will be a quarter of a block at the intersection of that avenue with Pico.
It is part of the exchange for Manzana 66 in Balvanera, more than 11 kilometers from there.
It is expected to be ready in March.
“I saw that they had started work and, when I asked the boy who guards the gate, he only told me that 'flor de torre' was coming.
Luckily, now I see that most of the land
is going to be used as a square”,
Federico (33), a resident of the area, sighs with some relief.
Although the guard was not lying: it is expected that a building will be built
in the private part of the lot .
But to understand the reason for a square and a building on that corner of Saavedra, you have to start at the beginning.
The gigantic piece of land, of
6,500 square meters
, remained in the possession of the domain holder of block 66, a property on Av. Belgrano and Av. Jujuy.
This was exchanged in 2017 for the lot on Avenida San Isidro Labrador between Vedia and Pico.
The owner of Manzana 66 wanted to build a micro
-stadium at that point in Balvanera .
Neighbors objected and recalled their plans for a public green space to be created there.
After much struggle, the installation of a plaza was approved through Law 5,800.
This norm also stipulates that, as
compensation
, the Saavedra lot be transferred to the owner.
Saavedra.
In 40% of the land there will be a square.
And in the remaining space a building.
Photo: Marcelo Carroll.
But it was not a transfer just like that:
40% of this land (2,800 square meters) must be a square
, whose construction budget is borne by the private sector.
The aforementioned law even highlights the obligation that half of the square be an absorbent green area with trees and shrubs, and that there be both a sports sector and another for children's games.
Once the plaza is ready, the owner will cede the space as an administrative easement to the City Government, which in turn will be responsible for its maintenance.
In 60% of the remaining property there will be a building,
which can begin to rise only when the square is finished, according to the secretariat.
The square is built by the Pecam group from Rosario, which was already in charge of building the almost 700 homes of the new Villa Fraga, in Chacarita.
It will have two main paths that will delimit the different sectors of the square.
The location of the future San Isidro Labrador square, in Saavedra.
In addition to the tropical format games there will be tables, seating areas, drinking fountains and a bicycle rack, as promised by the City's Urban Development Secretariat.
Trees and shrubs will also be planted, a rarity on a block where there are no plants, not even to refresh the wait for passengers on six bus lines.
Terminal, plaza, school?
The block where the square will be is delimited by San Isidro Labrador avenue to the east, Pico to the south, Vedia to the north and Vidal to the west.
It is twice as wide as a common block because at that point Moldes street (intermediate between San Isidro and Vidal avenues) cuts off.
Until the 1960s, the terminal of the former City State Transport Corporation operated there, head of lines 151, the defunct 154 and the old 171, today 71.
In the late 1970s, half of the block closest to Vidal was used to build Elementary School No. 15 Province of Santa Fe, with access via Pico.
In the other half, the offices, workshops and playground of the companies MODO and La Nueva Metropol (lines 90, 151, 194) operated until 2018. It was at that time that the land with a gate on Avenida San Isidro Labrador 4850
was precariously fenced off.
A simulated image of what the plaza and the games station will be like on San Isidro Labrador street, in Saavedra.
Soon it would be populated with trees and the occasional cat.
But what is left of nature
lacks movement and light
.
Years passed and nothing was done in those 6,500 square meters.
Members of neighborhood organizations demanded a work there, but
not for a square, but for a school.
"We always accompanied the request of the Santa Fe Province School to build a secondary school there," Hugo Campos, from the Neighbors x Ecology Association, explained to this newspaper.
From that organization they have been participating in instances of discussion every time something wanted to be projected on that property, such as the public hearing for Manzana 66, in which residents of Saavedra
repudiated the exchange.
But there is no turning back, although for now, the only thing already finished in that space are some trails and the playground island, still lost in the middle of so much level land.
A mixer, a pair of orange cones and the personnel vehicles involved in the work complete the landscape.
Despite this, the Buenos Aires government
trusts that everything will be ready in March.
SC
look too
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