La Fuixarda: Barcelona’s urban climbing area loses half of its routes

In November 2009, heavy rains caused a section the cliff of La Fuxi to collapse. The city immediately closed street to remove the rubbles and determine if the rest of the cliff was stable.

The decision as subsequent actions have now been taken and it’s not good news at all for those how came to love la Fuxi: the Cliff is now off limits to climbing forever and its 50+ excellent routes have been rendered unclimbable with steel rods and heavy duty wire mesh.

The tunnel part remains open and there is not reason to think this will change. Some of the less popular routes on the cemented cliff, just outside of the tunnel were not covered with wire, but steel rods where driven in this section as well, making it unsafe to climb

La Fuixarda, a free access climbing area at the heart of Barcelona has always been regarded as a very special place for climbers. Having a space like this one in a major city is truly unique. The group of people who set out to develop and equip these lines did so voluntarily and through much hard work and dedication of resources. They turned the place into a giant playground enjoyed by thousands of people.

The area has always been a liability for the city, and many climbers suspect that the local administration had been looking for a pretext to shut it down for some times. Meshing the entire cliff does seem much more like an effort to keep climbers away that citizen protection. We can only hope that that tunnel will remain freely accessible for climbers, but there isn’t any real guarantee for this.