The urban planning architect Víctor García Gil, from AUG-ARQUITECTOS, SLP, has participated as a teacher in the Master in Permanent Training in Urban Planning, Dynamization and Sustainable Development of Small Municipalities and Cities, organized by the School of Roads, Canals and Ports (Ciudad Real) of the University of Castilla-La Mancha. His participation has taken place in two classes and a workshop on the ground, in the Albacete town of Alcalá del Júcar. The first class focused on urban planning in Alcalá del Júcar, a town where the company run by the urban planner has been working for several years and for which he has written the Comprehensive Urban Regeneration Master Plan (first prize in Castilla-La Mancha in 2017), the Special Plan for the Protection of the Historic-Artistic Complex and the Municipal Planning Plan. In this first class, which was taught on April 30, topics such as the absence of planning (starting point of the work carried out in the municipality), the weaknesses and threats presented by the town, the strengths and opportunities, the beginning of the works, the definition of an action strategy, the scales of work (from the landscape to the hidden Alcalá), the urban planning (POM), the protection of heritage (PEPCHA), the Master Plan for Comprehensive Urban Regeneration of the CHA and the perspectives that are offered, as well as a provisional balance of the work carried out in recent years.
The second class, held on May 7, was dedicated to exposing his experience of more than three decades of work in the field of urban planning in small municipalities and in it he discussed the situation of small towns in large municipalities, the effects of the legislator on action, the institutional divorce between local administrations and the rest of the public Administration, the landscape, heritage and green infrastructure of this type of municipalities, sectoral and territorial conditions, the incidence of environmental evaluation and urban planning processing, new sensitivities , the devaluation of the norm and the judicialization of urban planning, to conclude with the characteristics of planning in rural environments, proposals and keys to urban planning.
In a more relaxed atmosphere, the aforementioned architect shared part of the morning of Saturday, May 18, with the Master’s students in his field visit and workshop, in Alcalá del Júcar.
Throughout the presentations, Víctor García Gil stressed that the professional practice of urban planning in small municipalities requires a series of qualities without which it becomes an unpleasant experience without a future: mastery of the complex legal, technical and administrative framework, Management and “digestion” capacity, patience, tenacity and the possible availability of alternative economic resources are essential requirements for the urban planner. Precisely for this reason, there is an evident absence of generational change among professionals and a notable abandonment of many of those who tried to work as urban planners. The prize for those who venture down this path and decide to endure is to be able to intervene in vast territories, with a wide and rich heritage, where a population survives that deserves an opportunity and that generously entrusts us with the planning of the territory where they spend their lives.