The Bilbao airport, the Valencia Agora…, Calatrava’s other controversial works

2023-10-03 10:13:20

The announcement of the closure of the Athens Olympic stadium due to failures in the stability of the dome designed by Santiago Calatrava has once again put the Spanish architect in the eye of the storm. Calatrava has always defended that it is the lack of maintenance by the responsible authorities the cause of the deterioration of their works, some of which have been object of great controversy.

Bilbao airport

The roof of the Loiu airport, which turned 20 years old in 2020, has suffered leaks and leaks during most of them and has required an enormous investment of public money to alleviate its deficiencies. According to ‘El Correo’, On the same day it was inaugurated, the underground corridor leading to the parking lot had to be cordoned off because water began to leak. They had to invest 4.3 million euros and two years of works to resolve a problem that was attributed to Santiago Calatrava’s design. One of his spokespersons assured this newspaper that it seemed “unfair to imply that it could be the responsibility of our company.”

That same source pointed out that the architect’s studio was only in charge of carrying out the preliminary project and the basic project and that both the execution of the work and the various structural calculations were carried out by other professionals.

The Agora and the Palau de las Arts in Valencia

The Agora of the City of Arts and Sciences, now reborn as CaixaForum Valencia, also had problems. In 2015, Calatrava urged the Generalitat to improve the “defective” installation of the steel plates that supported the trencadís of the roof “to avoid any risk of detachment from the façade.” Before the Palauwhich is part of the same complex, also suffered problems after the falling of a part of the coating Of the cover. The Valencian Generalitat closed the venue and studied legal measures. In 2015, work began to reinstall the trencadís after the detachment. The start of these works occurred after the agreement reached with the Valencian architect and the Temporary Union of Companies that built the site (which had a final cost of more than four hundred million euros).

Oviedo Congress Palace

The Supreme Court sentenced Calatrava to compensate the developer Jovellanos XXI with 2.96 million euros for its “negligence” and “widespread failure” in the construction of the Oviedo Congress Palace. The building suffered the demolition of a stand during the works and a roof planned as mobile by the contract finally had to be fixed.

Constitution Bridge in Venice

Known as the Calatrava bridge, it was inaugurated in 2008 in the Italian city. The work was involved from the beginning in problems, delays and changes to improve accessibility for people in wheelchairs. Residents and tourists they slipped easily, especially in the rain, because of the floor and the glass steps. The budget for the work was 6.7 million euros, but in the end it cost 11.6 million, almost five million more. The Court of Auditors investigated these extra costs and in 2019 sentenced the Spanish architect to a fine of almost 78,000 euros for errors that made its construction more expensive. The judges affirmed that these rulings were a “macroscopic negligence”, which led to the increase in the cost of the project, which had to be modified several times.