New cultural centre project in Benalmádena Pueblo begins to take shape

The town hall has revealed the exact location of a new cultural centre, and that it will have a library, museum, auditorium and assembly hall, and even a car park with 80 spaces. It also announced that it will not be called "Casa de la Cultura" but "Centro Cultural de Benalmádena Pueblo". But what will this new space actually be like, how much will it cost, and how long will it take to build? These questions are still unanswered, but could soon be revealed after the council put the project out to tender on Tuesday for 1.17 million euros: this will include all the technical work, from the drafting of the basic and execution projects, to the management of the work, including the legalisation of the installations and the coordination of health and safety in the drafting and execution phases. The winning project will be in charge of all of this, based on the preliminary project drawn up by municipal technicians.

Although the amount legally requires the authorities to raise the technical solvency criteria (as it is a contract subject to harmonised regulation — known in the sector as a SARA contract), the truth is that the town hall is looking for an architecture firm with relevant experience, due to the complexity of the site where the work will be carried out. This involves not only the 1,000-square-metre plot acquired to build the cultural centre on Avenida Juan Luis Peralta, but also the adjacent plot purchased by the council to be used as an archaeological storage facility.

To this end, the council has decided to ‘reward’ the previous work carried out by architectural firms applying for the tender, by including in the evaluation criteria for awarding the contract the “experience of the technical staff executing the contract”, weighted at 20 out of 100 points, and any “recognitions and awards” in architecture, worth five points. The technical proposal accounts for nearly half of the total score (45 points), while the remaining evaluation will be based on cost (20 points) and delivery time (10 points). None of this will be made public before 26 September, the deadline for submitting bids.

In addition to a library, museum, auditorium and assembly hall, the new centre will have a tourist information point and will also house the permanent exhibition of Magdalena Nile del Río, better known as Imperio Argentina, who lived and died in Benalmádena.

The council has been working on the project since the beginning of the mandate. In August 2023 the full council approved an extraordinary credit of 1.5 million euros: four months later, the local authority acquired the main plot, and at the beginning of this year, it demolished the building located on it.