Estepona town council has taken a further step towards realising a beachfront hotel in a strategic location within the municipality. The project is situated in ... zone A-UEN-R2 ‘Hotel Seghers’, next to the marina, the seafront promenade and Cristo Beach, on a plot measuring 13,524.85 square metres. The developer, Seghers Luxury Hotel, SL, has commissioned a detailed design study proposing a maximum buildable area of 6,880 square metres and a building comprising a ground floor, four upper floors and an attic. The application is currently at the planning stage and does not constitute authorisation to commence works on this plot, which takes its name from the establishment that once stood there - the Seghers Club - and which has been disused for decades.
The controversy does not centre on the buildable area - the 6,880 square metres correspond to the historical buildable area specified in the planning file - but rather on how that volume is realised. The specific planning document for the area originally stipulated a maximum height of two storeys. However, the Detailed Design Study subjects the development to the parameters of Hotel Regulation H-3, which permits a ground floor, four storeys and an attic. In practice, the building would go from two storeys to six visible levels.
The town council emphasises that the approved detailed study ‘does not alter the planning parameters’ established for that area, has received favourable technical reports, and is a planning instrument that simply regulates the use of the plot. However, residents from various owners’ associations and the PSOE have expressed their disapproval. The opposition maintains that it is not questioning the construction of a hotel, but is demanding that the specific parameters of the plot be respected and that the volumetric impact on the surrounding area be properly assessed.
Environmentalists argue that the planning instrument has been ‘misused’ and are calling for the protection of an adjacent drovers' track
The plot was already well known during the years of the GIL administration. The site was at the centre of a controversial development promoted by Pedro Román, Jesús Gil’s former deputy mayor in Marbella and one of those convicted in the Malaya case. Before the crackdown on planning corruption began in 2002, Román, through Development Projet, SA, sought to drastically increase the buildable area from the original 6,880 square metres to 20,575 (a 320 per cent increase), with a capital gain estimated at the time at 18 million euros. That initiative became bogged down in the legal turmoil surrounding the ‘Gilismo’ scandal, and in 2020 the process of the site’s judicial sale began, with its value at that time estimated at around 24 million euros.
Rejection and doubts
Whilst during the Gil era the debate centred on how much was being built, the current discussion focuses on how the permitted building quota is allocated. Ecologistas Malaka has joined the planning dispute, arguing that the detailed study is being ‘misused’ because, under this planning instrument, ‘only minor adjustments may be made’ and, under no circumstances, “alter the land-use provisions or the building rights established by the General Plan”.
The organisation has raised concerns about the situation regarding the Cañada Real de Los Barrios to Estepona - an adjacent drovers track - to prevent it from effectively becoming part of the private development. Furthermore, Ecologistas Malaka criticises the fact that no specific environmental impact assessment has been required to analyse the landscape, soil permeability and the cumulative effect of tourist overcrowding on the coast, whilst also calling for guarantees that the 2,846 square metres of green space will serve a genuine environmental purpose and not merely an ornamental one.
The project is currently at the preliminary stage. The development must complete the planning process before the developer can apply for the relevant planning permission.