The Serra, a cultural landscape in danger
The declaration of the Serra de Tramuntana mountain range as a World Heritage Site in the cultural landscape category was a participatory, open, and cross-cutting process that served as a tribute to the legacy of our ancestors. For Mallorca, inscription on the renowned UNESCO list meant joining the most prestigious international ranking in the field of heritage conservation. And not for a single heritage element, but for an entire landscape, one of the most extensive declared as such up to 2011; and moreover, a cultural landscape, that is, a whole territory where, thanks to human transformation, new values have been sculpted, making it even more unique and more worthy of protection. This designation also allowed for further protection of the surrounding area, as demonstrated by the declassification of the Es Guix urban development, in the heart of the Tramuntana, which was upheld in court because it was located within an area inscribed on the World Heritage List.
The transformation of a rugged and challenging landscape, thanks to local ingenuity, into a prosperous and fertile area, making use of the resources the Serra itself offered, such as stone and water, was a slow, patient process, not without its dark and difficult periods, which has ultimately produced a unique landscape in the heart of the Mediterranean. It is not, therefore, the work of great architects or renowned artists that has bestowed upon it its unique heritage value; it is the anonymous, immense, and often thankless labor of thousands of hands who, out of necessity and with wisdom passed down from generation to generation, transformed these mountains into a network of terraced fields, paths, olive groves, irrigation ditches, and orchards, providing its inhabitants with a means of livelihood and prosperity beyond any other. This entire heritage, in order to be preserved, requires the preservation of its fundamental element: its people.
Whenever the People's Party has been in charge of managing this landscape, it has completely neglected any active work to preserve the heritage of terraces, irrigation ditches, and paths. It has taken two main approaches: using the protected status designation as a purely tourist brand; and encouraging, without much qualms, real estate speculation through decisions that have resulted in urban planning amnesties, reduced environmental and heritage protections, increased tourist pressure, and significant real estate development pressure.
In this latest phase, that of the PP-Vox pact, the result of their decisions is clear: over 60% of property sales in the Serra de Tramuntana are by people from outside the area; housing prices have skyrocketed alarmingly, and many people, young and old, are now forced to leave their village, their home, because they are unable to find a place to live. Expelled from paradise, simply for not being able to afford it.
If the landscape was created by its people, and those people are now forced to leave, it's clear that the cultural landscape we built over generations is more endangered than ever. We need active management, tools to help reduce, not increase, the pressure from tourism and real estate development, and incentives for people to find ways to continue enriching and protecting it for future generations—whether in agriculture, the environment, research and innovation, or other sectors. And above all, we need to be able to continue living there as their parents and godparents have.
The Serra is not a stage set, it is a living landscape, and as such we are obliged to maintain it.
