The fast track of Cort to grant urban planning licenses has only sped up 15 in more than two years

PalmaThe fast track that Palma City Council announced in May 2024 to speed up the granting of urban planning licenses has only accelerated 15 of them so far. The City Council assures that there are ten more licenses in process, but it has not provided the rest of the data necessary to evaluate how the system is working. More than two weeks after receiving the questions from ARA Balears, Urban Planning continues to not clarify how many applications have been submitted, what the average timeframe is, how much the service costs, or if the queue for the ordinary process has been reduced.

The system allows Urban Collaboration Entities (ECU), accredited and authorized private entities, to previously review projects and issue a certificate of compliance. The granting of the license continues to be the responsibility of the City Council, but the interested party can opt for this private review, which is paid, with the objective of shortening the timeframes.

The Councilor for Urban Planning, Housing and Strategic Projects, Óscar Fidalgo, announced in May 2024 that Cort would implement this formula as soon as the Government approved the administrative simplification decree law. The Government did so on May 24 of that same year and the regulation governed the intervention of private certification entities in the processing of urban planning licenses.

Fidalgo defended at the time that the new route would allow obtaining a license in an approximate period of three months. He also assured that it would benefit the files that continued through the ordinary route, because the municipal technicians would have fewer projects to review. “If out of 300 license applications the ECUs resolve 150, the other 150 will be assumed by Cort with more speed,” he stated.

The first one, in February 2026

The first urban planning license in Palma processed with the intervention of an ECU was not granted until February 17, 2026, one year and nine months after the announcement. The file, corresponding to a new construction project, was processed in approximately one month.

A little more than two months earlier, in December 2025, Fidalgo had stated that the ECUs had been working in Palma for more than a year. The councilor specified, however, that the projects being processed with these entities were “almost experimental” and pointed out that the ECU staff still needed to be trained to thoroughly understand the specific functioning of Palma.

Cort has not explained how many files the ECUs reviewed during that period nor why, if they had already been working in Palma for more than a year, the first license was not granted until February 2026.

The latest case announced by the City Council corresponds to the construction of 62 limited-price homes in the Olivera neighborhood. The Urban Planning Management approved the granting of the license on September 15 and assured that it had been processed in 50 days thanks to the support of the ECUs registered in Palma, even though the Management Council had not met during August.

In the press release regarding this project, Cort reported that the incorporation of the ECUs had allowed 15 licenses to be “expedited” and that there were ten more in the processing stage.

A figure, but no balance

These are the only figures that Cort has provided so far regarding the overall balance of the system. The City Council has not detailed how many applications have been submitted through an ECU since this possibility was enabled. It has also not specified whether the 15 licenses it claims to have "expedited" are all resolved, nor if other files have been submitted that have been rejected, have become void, or are pending amendments.

Urban Planning has also not provided the actual average timeframe for licenses processed with an ECU. The approximate one-month timeframe for the first file and the 50 days for the Olivera project are two concrete cases, but they do not allow for calculating the average of all applications.

Cort also leaves unanswered what the current average timeframe for the ordinary route is. In February 2026, upon announcing the first license processed with an ECU, the City Council placed this average between nine and twelve months once the documentation was complete. Seven months later, it has not provided an updated figure. This data is necessary to verify whether the intervention of private entities has relieved municipal technicians and reduced the wait for developers who do not pay to use an ECU, just as Fidalgo had announced.

The City Council has not communicated how many entities are authorized to work in Palma, how many have effectively processed any file, or what the cost of the service is for the applicant. It has also not quantified the evolution of the municipal queue since the system was launched.

More than two weeks without a response

ARA Balears sent these questions to the City Council's press office on September 14. Cort confirmed that they had been forwarded to the Urban Planning department and, the following day, published the note regarding the 62 homes in L'Olivera, in which it included the figures of 15 expedited licenses and ten more in process.

On September 17, after this newspaper requested the answers again, the press office sent ARA Balears that note and assured that it would provide the requested data. Fifteen days after the first request, the City Council has not sent any further response.