Beaches, the first assault of the summer: «But going to the sea costs too much»
Full on the island despite the increases in prices for umbrellas and parking
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It is the first Sunday of the official summer, of the beautiful season. A little uncertain, but it is, and the beach industry is preparing to cash in as much as possible.
In Southern Sardinia, particularly on the coasts towards Villasimius, Costa Rei and Pula, we are preparing for a great season but with different rules: what the concessionaires can do on some coasts is denied in others, and the fault lies with the Municipalities of the whole island who in 14 years have not equipped themselves with the urban planning tool: the Pul.
«You pay a lot and the services are not always up to par», gets angry Giorgio Vargiu, regional president of Adiconsum, a consumer defense association: «The factories bleed us after having occupied the most valuable pieces, there is no balance between concession tracts, the best ones, and the free ones, close to river mouths or ports. By dint of extensions despite the Bolkestein directive providing for the beaches to be banned again, in fact we have private beaches and this cannot be done."
According to the entrepreneurs who make money off the Sardinian beaches, life isn't easy for them either. So much so that the services are often lacking, sometimes poor quality, even though you pay for umbrellas and sunbeds.
And while the managers claim that concessions spend between 25 and 50 euros per day for an umbrella and two sunbeds, and that on the Peninsula it reaches 120 in less valuable coastlines, Adicosum speaks of an «exponential increase in tariffs for expired concessions without possibility extension in 2023, which should be returned". President Vargiu recalls that the concessions must serve a public interest, «instead only the private interest is pursued and at a high price, without improving the service. The beaches are in fact private property, those with limited numbers even more so: you pay to get nothing in return. The same goes for parking: municipalities make money without looking after cars."
Luigi Almiento
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