The tunnel revolution - Henares up to date
For some time I have the habit of opening the year by taking a good walk around Guadalajara that does not require taking the car. The municipal term of our city gives a lot of itself in terms of roads and paths and many of them are connected to the urban area in a natural way. The reason is that before we hikers arrived, the paths were already there; They were used to get to the capital from nearby towns such as Horche, Lupiana or Aldeanueva. These traditional paths were losing meaning as the roads gained weight and precisely these have been the ones that have condemned their accesses.
The city of Guadalajara is naturally surrounded by the Henares River, a limit that was overcome with the construction of the Los Manantiales or La Chopera neighborhood. However, it is the artificial limits, in the form of roads, that mark the true borders of this. We are talking about the A2 and the Ronda Norte (CM-10), which condition the urban planning of Guadalajara and are a real headache for those who want to enjoy the natural environment of the city. The reason is that most of the steps that connect the city with the old roads through tunnels have been respected, but they are in a lamentable state. And this is where I return to the beginning of the story: I was on my way to La Galianilla with some friends on the first of the year, going through what I call "the dark tunnel" that crosses the A2 at Paseo de Francisco Aritmendi, when one of my colleagues told me: “this must be denounced”. I call this tunnel the “scary tunnel” because from the outside it looks like a black hole, although the eyes quickly get used to the darkness. What you see inside are graffiti, weeds, rubbish and abandoned furniture, a situation that is repeated in most of the underpasses that give access to the roads beyond the A2.
.Children learn how to behave socially and emotionally by imitating the behavior of those closest to them.… https:// t.co/nEHBBuNWZo
— UNICEF Uganda Tue Jan 10 10:41:24 +0000 2017
It occurred to me to denounce this situation through twitter and many residents of Guadalajara responded, showing similar situations in other tunnels in the city. The City Council's response, which arrived twenty days after the original publication, affirmed that the cleaning of these steps is not the responsibility of the consistory and invited hikers to use another nearby step.
Meanwhile, my friend Ángel de Juan wrote in Caminos de Guadalajara about the need to build a pedestrian walkway over the Ronda Norte for those who want to access the old Camino de Tórtola, at the height of Bulevar de Clara Campoamor. The alternative is to go to the tunnel of La Muñeca or use the passage for vehicles and skip a fence. Both options leave a lot to be desired, one for being far away and the other for being dangerous.
The response on social networks continued to amplify, especially after the response from the City Council. The conclusion: the underground passages that give access to the roads of Guadalajara are a shame, with some exceptions. The City Council appeals to Fomento, who has jurisdiction, and claims to have transferred the complaint, but the reality is that the Cañada de Alcohete, the Camino de Tórtola, the Camino de la Cuesta or the Camino de Aldeanueva existed before there were roads, and although they are not as busy as before, they are worth considering. There are many of us who dream of decent access to the city's traditional paths, as the citizen response has shown, a need that would enhance the extensive traditional access network to the city, which could well be enriched with a network of trails that will make it easier for non-experts to travel, promoting healthy leisure and enhancing the natural environment of Guadalajara.
