A miscommunication on the part of the Lisbon City Council has led to confusion around the Santa Apolónia Fort. An inclusive playground had already been decided for this site - an idea that came out of the 2018/19 Participatory Budget (PB) - when, in the 2021 edition of the PB, a group of residents proposed and voted...
Not far from the railway station and facing the river, stand some ruins of what once was the Santa Apolónia Forta defensive wall that was never completed and was erected in the second half of the 17th century. The fort would be part of a defensive line for the city along the Tagus River, planned during the Wars of Restoration, and involving the construction of three dozen bastions in Lisbon.
In 1968, the Santa Apolónia Fort passed into the possession of the Lisbon City Council and, during the 1980s, a 14-story residential building, the Concorde building, was built on top of it. In 1996, the fort was classified as Property of Public Interest (IIP), thus safeguarding what the construction of Concorde and the urban pressure did not destroy. Today, only a few walls remain of the fort, although in a state of degradation. Parts of these walls have been replaced by cement walls to prevent the land from collapsing in an area that has since been consolidated.
The Forte de Santa Apolónia is located in the parish of Penha de França, on the border with the parish of São Vicente. As noted by Mariana Aires Ferreira, in a master's paper submitted in June 2017, "since the Fort was declared IIP in 1996, little has been done to maintain and rehabilitate the monument". The then student collected some significant milestones: in 2009, the Forte area was integrated into the Detail Plan of Calçada das LajesBetween 2015 and 2016, emergency work was carried out due to the risk of the wall in front of the Concorde building and scattered walls in the Fort's area collapsing. Prior to these interventions on these walls, in 2014, the inner area of the Fort, inside the walls, was rehabilitated with the creation of a small recreational space with community gardens, walking paths, small trees, and some benches and seating areas.
But for neighbors of São João (Penha de França)the green space created is insufficient to satisfy their leisure needs. They want a real garden in the Santa Apolónia Fortress, which would serve the local population [the Penha parish has a high population density and few green spaces], which would attract people to the parish and dignify that forgotten part of the city and the monument.
A garden at the fort
Therefore, in 2021, a group of residents called for the creation of a real green space inside the Fort, using Participatory Budgeting (PB). The proposal, estimated at 150 thousand eurosharvested 177 votes and ended up being one of those selected in that annual edition of the PB. Once the voting was over and the proposal was selected, Sandra Campos, the main proponent, would only have to wait for the garden creation process to make its way through the PB and the municipal services - like any proposal that is submitted under this participatory procedure - and for the project to end up on the ground.
However, Sandra began to find it strange silences on the part of the Chamber. "I received in 2021, in June, an email from the City Council saying that I had won the Participatory Budgeting with the proposal for the Santa Apolónia Fort and that they were going to contact me to receive the trophy. But nothing happened. In January 2022, I received another e-mail saying that the City Council had approved the budget and that I would be able to contact the winners. And, again, nothing.reports to Lisboa Para Pessoas (LPP).
It was then that he decided to go to his account on the OP's website "see if anything would be there". And, at that moment, he would have stumbled upon something: the Lisbon City Hall had integrated two winning PB projects into one, without involving the respective bidders - or, at least, to you. This integration happened by keeping the original title of Sandra's proposal, "but the entire description of the garden was deleted and they put only a reference to a landscaping framework to a future inclusive playground".
The change was reportedly made between the technical evaluation of the Sandra's proposal by the Chamber and its publication for voting. "Initially I even thought they changed this already after we won but I questioned the Lisbon City Council about it and they told me no"he says. "I didn't notice at the time of the vote why they kept the title" And that's what appeared in the shares on the social networks. "There was nothing in the PB process that made me go inside the page, not least because it doesn't even have a counter so we know how many votes we're looking at. There's nothing to make us go there to see if there's anything new."guarantees Sandra.
The inclusive playground resulted from a previous edition of the PB, the 2018/19 edition, as we will see later in this article. And, when the 2021 PB started, that playground was already planned for the Santa Apolónia Fort, with a project designed - that is, there was a commitment made for that space; only that nobody at Lisbon City Hall warned Sandra at the moment of presentation, to the PB, of their idea of the garden for that same Fort. And this miscommunication led to two citizens' ideas clashing for the same space, as we will see later as well.
The Participatory Budgeting regulation allows, in article 9, that two winning ideas be combined into one "in view of the similarity of content, their complementarity, or their proximity at the level of location"but this process has to be done "in conjunction with the bidders". The regulation also makes it clear, in article 17, that the involvement of the authors of the ideas voted on must be constant, both "in an early definition phase of the project, as well as in the following phases of its development, or whenever necessary, ensuring that the bidder will be able to see the final solution implemented". Sandra claims that these two paragraphs have not been met.
A playground and a garden?
A proposal for an inclusive playground adapted for children with limited mobility was launched by Patrícia Leal and was the winner of the 2018/19 edition of the Participatory Budgetwith 1096 votes from the community. Budgeted at 300 thousand euros, the proposal was intended for the parish of São Vicente - neighboring the parish of Penha - and, at an initial stage, was not intended for the Forte de Santa Apolónia.
Speaking at the Lisbon Municipal Assembly (AML) last March, Councilman Diogo Moura, responsible for the PB portfolio, explained that, at the end of the previous term, different locations for the playground in the parish of São Vicente were analyzed, and the conclusion was reached that the best of them would be in the neighboring parish of Penha, on the site of the Santa Apolónia Fort. Also during this mandate, in 2020, there were two meetings between the City Council and the proponent of the winning idea, to present the project and discuss the locations, and the "comprehensive study process for the entire Fort area". In other words, "before the start of the 2021 PB cycle, there was a proposal already approved by the City Council services and a study was already being developed. There was already a commitment to build this inclusive/adapted playground within the Santa Apolónia bulwark". To Diogo Moura, "the Chamber had two choices in the previous mandate: either it said that there was a commitment for that space and rejected the proposal - and there would never be a proposal for the Baluarte de Santa Apolónia in the terms that were presented by the proponents - or it included that commitment in the Chamber. And I think the Chamber rightly made that inclusion, and I think the final project is quite good for the site. We're talking about two projects that are complementary and compatible."
To Lisbon For People, Patrícia Leal confirms the meetings with the municipality's services and field visits to evaluate different location options. "The [municipal] technicians saw several spaces with me, only all the ones we saw didn't give for one reason or another"he says, stressing that the people of the Chamber "were relentless in finding spaces". "I trust the technicians. And I trusted their word that I couldn't stay here, in my parish. I think that decision was made with kindness. I didn't see any bad intention behind it. I just saw a set of people who tried to find a space over this time, and there was no space in St. Vincent."said Patrícia. "I'm not a technician, I'm not an engineer, I'm not an architect, I'm nothing. It's not my fault that the playground went there. I only accepted it because the technicians from the City Council told me that there was no space available in my parish."
The first idea for a location that Patrícia suggested was in the back of the Water Museum/EPAL, next to the Escadinhas das Comendadeiras de Santos. "I was told that it was very close to a structuring road, the Avenida Mouzinho de Albuquerque, where many cars pass. It was a space that was there in abandonment, but I was told that those lands were not good to receive the park. Then I went there and understood better." Quinta do Ferro was also mentioned (also because this area is integrated in a specific urban rehabilitation project) and from another location in Vale de Santo António (same problem - it's integrated into an urbanization plan that has been slow to get off the drawing board. About the Forte de Santa Apolónia, Patrícia says she didn't think it was bad. "I thought it might actually be a good place, I had some schools nearby. And from the top, where I came in when I went there, I didn't think it was inaccessible."
A playground for every child
On the playground proposal page on the PB websiteThe previous illustration, made by the technical services of the Lisbon City Hall, and a description of the project can be found. According to this, the playground would occupy "the area where the urban gardens are currently located, at the lowest level (...) because it is flatter and more adaptable to the project, reducing the complexity of its implementation". It would involve "implementation of an inclusive play area focusing on the infant age group, which enables differentiated recreational action, for a wide range of children with and without physical or cognitive limitations"and is intended to "socialization and interaction of all children both in the space and on the play equipment".
This play area would involve 620 square meters and would be divided in two: one space with several toys "deployed on synthetic, continuous, cushioning sidewalk" and surrounded by a "ample living area"consisting of reinforced concrete bencheswhere mothers and fathers could sit; and a "175-square-meter sensory garden"This is the place where the children would find "sensory (tactile and musical) and challenging (cognitive) devices, as well as a green, watered area, with planting of species of aromatic characteristics capable of awakening the senses (smell and touch)". Fences would be put up at the access to the park and at the side boundaries of the sensory garden, new lighting, and also an EPAL drinking fountain.
The park would have capacity for 124 children from two to 14 years old. "At a later stage." the whole area above the defensive structure would be "intervened for landscape framing, improvement of accesses and structuring of the space".This would include the creation of a small parking lot and ramps accessible to anyone. They would also be "placed tactile flooring solutions that guide blind users in the play area and its access, as well as, a device with audio description that provides blind people with the descriptive of the location, distribution of devices, usage and safety advice, so that they can orient themselves autonomously in the playground space and surrounding area if necessary"says the technical description available on the OP website.
According to the proposal's page on the OP website, where you can read several updates about it, the playground, "although autonomous"would be integrated in a "global study for the whole area" of the Fort and was to be realized in the year 2022. It never came to pass. The last published update on the equipment dates back to April of last year: "The project is broken down into a contract (under launch of contract) and a supply by material criteria. Procurement procedure in preparation."
Park decided before the Garden
Diogo Moura is an advocate for inclusive playgrounds in the city. When he was a member of the AML, not a councilman - that is, during the previous municipal mandate - Moura brought up for discussion two proposals for the creation of a network of playgrounds adapted to any child, regardless of his or her physical condition.
The first was unanimously approved in October 2018 and recommended that the House, "in close collaboration and coordination with the Parish Councils"to evaluate and study the "possibility of adapting the city's playgrounds to children with disabilities, through the placement of suitable furniture model and remodeling, where necessary, of their access and flooring".
A second recommendation was presented in March 2020 in order to strengthen compliance with the former: "the CDS-PP Municipal Group proposes that the Lisbon Municipal Assembly recommend to the Lisbon City Council that, in conjunction with the Parish Councils, it draw up a plan for the implementation of inclusive playgrounds in the city, prioritizing the territorial coverage of the municipality"read the text, which was also unanimously approved. Moura made it more concrete: he asked for an inclusive playground in each of the five areas of the city by December 2020, "month in which we celebrate the National Day of the Person with Disability and the International Day of Persons with Disabilities, as a symbolic act and as an effective contribution to a Lisbon, an inclusive city for all". For the then centrist municipal deputy, it is a matter of "a necessary, fair and inclusive measure, allowing children, regardless of their physical and psychological condition, to share the same public recreational and play space".
The CDS' recommendations were never implemented by the municipality. However, Moura now mentioned in the AML that the City Council, of which he is now a part, intends to move forward with this network of inclusive playgrounds, looking with good eyes at the idea that came out of the 2018/19 PB. The Councilman also acknowledged that there was a communication error: for the integration of the playground into Sandra's garden proposal the respective bidders should have been involved. Now, Sandra Campos not only says that she was not taken into consideration in this union of projects, but she also believes that her original idea for a garden at the Forte would be substantially altered with the inclusion of the playground. For the resident of the parish of Penha de França, a park for children with limited mobility in that location doesn't even make sense because of all the inaccessibilities in the surrounding area, where there are steep, narrow streets and no universal pedestrian areas. And there are, in his view, other possible locations for the inclusive playground that do not compromise the winning project of a garden at the Santa Apolónia Fort.
"They want to have an adapted playground for children with mobility issues inside a Fort that has inaccessible accessibility"points to FFP. "And then why should we steal a Participatory Budget that belongs to the parish of São Vicente. Why should we have a PB from another parish to stick in there when people didn't vote for it?she said. With LPP and the Municipal Assembly, where Sandra had the opportunity to talk about this issue (as we will understand better later), she shared photos of danger signs of landslides already existing in the area, along with other images of the current state of the Fort and what they say are the bad accesses to it.
Sandra had a meeting with the Lisbon City Council on March 15, 2022, where he saw the city's project for the Forte with the inclusive playground: a design with few trees, with a car parking pocket, the so-called playground, and also a cemented area for fairs. "I got there and they stick a project on the table, saying that's what they were going to do and they were going to put two Participatory Budgets together"Sandra says. It was at this moment that the garden proponent says she got confirmation of the union of the two PBs.
When she submitted the garden to the PB, Sandra had a very different idea: would propose "recover a degraded site, safeguard a heritage value and promote a quality public green space" in a parish where these leisure areas are scarce. I'd like to"large multipurpose turf plots"a "logical and functional path network", a "planting as many trees as possible" (as stone pines to provide "plenty of shade") and hang on them "birdhouses"to have a picnic area with tables and benches, in the shade of these trees; and also"a kiosk selling small snacks, coffee and refreshments, or even newspapers". The project also included a children's area with a spider's web - something that was abandoned at the March 15 meeting because the municipality considered that it would be "dangerous".
In the AML, Diogo Moura confirmed it: "The project that was presented by the proponents for the Baluarte de Santa Apolónia had a playground, a park that was a copy of a Lisbon City Hall project from the early 2000s that consisted of a spider web. Today, a playground with a spider web no longer makes sense, is dangerous, and jeopardizes the safety of the children and those accompanying them. The project was adapted to an inclusive playground because, on the one hand, that's what the current requirements call for, on the other hand, because there is a network of inclusive playgrounds that the City Council wants to implement in the city, and also because it would make perfect sense for it to have an inclusive playground at that location."
Sandra has a different understanding: "I and the people who voted for the PB understood that children could play in the garden at will, without specific equipment. There doesn't need to be children's equipment in everything green spaces."he told Lisboa Para Pessoas. "We want to have a garden in a parish where there aren't many green spaces." But "they thought it was very funny to take the 300,000 euros from that other PB and the 150,000 from my PB, to do something there that is not a garden but a landscaping framework to a future playground." Sandra also agrees: "The City could have told me - and it had an obligation to do so - that there was a constraint on the Fort. They should have asked me if I wanted to keep my PB inside the Santa Apolónia Fort, accepting that there was already another PB there, or else think about another location."
A petition to defend the Garden
The disappointment and concern about the future of the garden project made Sandra launch at the very beginning 2022 uma online petition in defense of this very idea. The 310 signatures obtained meant that the petition was analyzed in the Municipal Assembly by the Permanent Committees dedicated to Green Structure, Citizenship, and Education."The residents voted for a Garden and they are entitled to have a Garden"The text of the petition reads. "The proposal was evaluated, approved, voted on by citizens, and in the end there was an expectation that their will was going to be respected." But, "after all, the CML and, apparently, the JFs felt free to completely ignore the will of the citizens and use at their pleasure the funds originally awarded to PBs and Citizenship".
Whenever a petition enters the AML, it is first analyzed in specialty by a Permanent Commission or by several Commissions, depending on the area in which the popular complaint is inserted. The Commission or Commissions listen to the various people and policy makers, and prepare a report with some conclusions and recommendations that, afterwards, in plenary, the municipal deputies can discuss and approve so that these recommendations can be formally addressed to the City Council. The process was followed, of course, with Sandra's petition, which was filed with the AML in June 2022. The report of the Commissions - three were called - was ready at the end of that year and was considered in plenary session, by all the municipal deputies and in the presence of Sandra and other petitioners last March 2. It was from the hearings held and the discussion in plenary that we were able to extract part of the story told throughout this article and statements from the various parties involved. The documents and the video of the plenary session can be seen at the end of the article.
The report of the AML Commissions that analyzed this issue is very clear: "it was concluded that the regulatory norms foreseen in the Participatory Budget 2021 were not properly complied with, given the lack of communication and information to the proponents of PB 35/2021". And two major recommendations are left to the Chamber, which have since been approved: that "revise/amend the Participatory Budgeting Regulation, in order to clarify and guarantee the involvement of the proponents in the different phases of the process"; and that "deliver on winning projects"by bringing together "with both proposers in order to find a consensus" e "admitting the possibility that the execution of POs may be joint or separate". These meetings are now taking place and Diogo Moura already manifested willingness to review the entire Participatory Budgeting process - which, by the way, did not take place in 2022 and will return only this year, after the summer, semi-renovated.
"We live in the city and we need spaces to allow contact with Nature, spaces for everyone, from the youngest to the oldest. And with so many schools nearby, there are many children who have no contact with Nature."Sandra spoke at the AML, in defense of Jardim and her petition. "What we would like is for the City Council to really listen to the people. We don't understand that the Chamber is sticking to the concrete policy and the idea of building an adapted playground on a site with no access and that will further waterproof the fort's soils pushing more water onto the wall, running the risk of it falling down, as happened in Valença." In the AML, he was accompanied by Bruno Palma, elected as an independent on the New Times for the São Vicente Parish Assembly, a supporter of the garden and playground idea, and a signer of the petition. Bruno showed a map of the parish of São Vicente and said: "That's two million square meters of São Vicente parish. Two million square meters where neither the President of the Parish Council of São Vicente nor the technicians of the Lisbon City Council could find a space to put the playground."
The two parish councils involved in this issue - São Vicente and Penha de França - have made statements in the context of Sandra's petition and to the AML. The Parish Council of São Vicente was succinct in its position, saying that "the Junta de Freguesia (parish council) believes that it should not comment on this matter" - this despite the fact that "this matter" has everything to do with the territory of the parish. He said, nevertheless, which "on principle" a PB proposed and voted for São Vicente should take place in this territorybut that "naturally its realization will be conditioned, in our opinion, to the feasibility of this project for the locations proposed by the citizens, a technically complex matter, but that is not decided by the Parish Council"It's up to the municipal services.
The Junta de Freguesia of Penha de França said that "did not oppose the relocation of the inclusive park project at the Santa Apolónia Fort". And it details: "the applicant's child Patrícia Leal attends the Patrício Prazeres School, located in Penha de França, which explains the agreement with the location of the adapted park in the Forte, which is close by. It should also be said, in this regard, that the Patrício Prazeres School is an inclusive school, has a nucleus dedicated to children with special educational needs, an educational community strongly mobilized for these issues and that has already won a Participatory Budget of the Parish Council for the installation of a Snoozlen Room, so the installation of the inclusive park in the vicinity fits very well in this cluster". The Junta da Penha also says that there was a "efforts to make the two proposals compatible" and that "it is usual, in the Participatory Budgets, for proposals to suffer changes after the technical analysis of the services, which try hard to ensure the viability and feasibility of citizens' ideas, so as not to reject proposals or cut civic participation".
Because the object analyzed was Sandra's petition and not the conflict between PBs, Patricia was not heard in the AML by the municipal deputies, but LPP also recognizes that there were "communication failures" in this whole process. "They should have told the proponent of this new proposal that they already had a playground designed for that location. They failed to communicate and that led to this whole misunderstanding."
For the proponent of the idea of the 2018/19 PB, the important thing is that "reach a consensus" so that "let this whole nightmare end and let there be an understanding"she said, confessing to being worn out by the subject."I am a mother of a child with a disability. And you can't imagine how painful that is. In Lisbon, children are practically excluded"he says. "This was an idea I had but I don't take it as my own, it was for the sake of the city, the children. My way of working is at the level of cooperation and understanding. I would like this to come out of the drawer, even if the park is not there in the Fort and it goes somewhere else. Patrícia praises the work of the municipal technicians. "The project was spectacular. They didn't forget anything. They made it for all kinds of disabilities, for those who can't hear, for those who can't see. They had a part of the garden with smells for the children and with sounds. They thought of all the children even, which is something that doesn't happen in every park. And I really felt a great investment from the technicians and that they were happy to have done this project."
For Patrícia, who has since been elected as an independent on the BE list for the São Vicente Parish Assembly, both projects are important for this territory. "Hers because green spaces are needed in this part of town, so we can breathe and have tranquility. Mine because children need to exercise one of their rights, which is the right to play."
