HAVANA — It’s unattainable to overlook. The massive rectangular mass of concrete and glass – the tallest constructing in Havana – dominates town skyline, towering 150 meters (490 toes) above colonial properties with its 542 luxurious rooms and majestic views of town and the ocean.
The Choice La Habana lodge, managed by Spanish chain Iberostar, has but to be inaugurated however it’s already the goal of criticism – and never just for its uncommon form. Cubans are questioning the federal government’s allocation of thousands and thousands of {dollars} in the direction of luxurious tourism whereas the island grapples with a extreme financial disaster and tourism numbers plummet to historic lows.
“All that cash may have been spent to construct hospitals and colleges,” lamented Susel Borges, a 26-year-old artisan, as she regarded as much as the towering edifice, identified to locals because the “Okay and 23 constructing” due to its location.
Positioned close to the legendary Habana Libre lodge and the long-lasting Coppelia ice cream parlor, the brand new lodge is a part of a authorities plan to construct a dozen luxurious institutions – primarily in Havana – that didn’t cease even through the COVID-19 pandemic and whereas current luxurious accommodations remained largely unoccupied.
For many years, tourism drove the Cuban financial system, producing annual revenues of as much as $3 billion. However in December, Cuban authorities mentioned solely 2.2 million vacationers visited the island in 2024, a lower of roughly 200,000 from 2023 and considerably decrease than the 4.2 million vacationers who visited in 2019.
The federal government attributes the decline in tourism to a “excellent storm” of things together with provide shortages, a extreme vitality disaster inflicting large blackouts and a scarcity of personnel, because of emigration and low wages. Moreover, the island is grappling with a surge in U.S. sanctions, together with restrictions on journey by U.S. residents, a ban on cruise ships and different measures particularly designed to stifle the expansion of Cuba’s tourism business.
“Tourism is gone,” mentioned Julio García Campos, driver of a shiny purple 1951 Pontiac with an unique engine. “Vacationers used to line as much as get on one in every of these!” he mentioned, recalling a bygone period when the island was bustling with American and European vacationers following a elimination of sanctions by then-President Barack Obama.
The brand new Choice La Habana, like all different accommodations in Cuba, is state-owned and operates underneath GAESA, a conglomerate belonging to the Ministry of the Revolutionary Armed Forces that has typically been criticized due to the opacity of its companies. As a military-run operation, it’s exempt from audits by the Comptroller Common’s Workplace and has not disclosed the quantity it invested within the 40-story lodge.
Cuban economist Pedro Monreal notes the “incongruity” of investing capital within the tourism sector when little or no is being allotted to strategic areas corresponding to agriculture.
“With meals insecurity a priority, it’s troubling that agricultural funding lags considerably behind tourism funding, remaining 11 instances decrease,” Monreal famous final yr on social media.
Architects additionally expressed little enthusiasm for the brand new lodge, pointing at its disruptive look throughout the atmosphere, its extreme top violating city laws and tall glass home windows which are ill-suited for a tropical local weather.
“This constructing serves as an ideal instance in our courses of what shouldn’t be accomplished when it comes to bioclimatic design,” mentioned Abel Tablada, an architect and college professor, including it’s “unforgivable” that the little cash out there to the Cuban state has been allotted to a constructing that doesn’t add worth to town.
