“We don’t lack anything to be angry about.” Carmen is over 80 years old, has lived in the neighborhood all her life, and today she is demonstrating against the decisions of the Santander City Council, which is governed by the Popular Party. No one would have said that a few months ago, but today nearly 2,500 people demonstrated in the Puertocheco area, and it’s hard to find a unique profile. What unites them is the refusal of a prior license to open a McDonald’s restaurant in the old neighborhood market. The concession, which will occupy more than 400 meters and a terrace for public use, will pay a fee of just 6,800 euros per year for 40 years and threatens the tranquility of neighbors who have not enjoyed it for a long time.
McDonald’s’ successful business has exhausted the patience of residents of some of the city’s wealthy neighborhoods. Puerto Chico and the area known as Insanche de Santander combine some of the highest median household incomes in the city (between €57,800 and €70,716, according to the latest National Institute of Statistics report in October 2025) and their neighbors vote overwhelmingly for the Popular Party (43% in 2023), but Mayor Gemma Igual’s policies, with the Party of the People’s absolute majority, are leading to burnout.
An unusual mix of protesters shouted: “Gemma Igual, you don’t care about the neighborhood.” Some remember the massive demonstrations that broke out in 2018 against another failed City Council project, the so-called Metrobus. Today, in 2025, elderly people come together holding signs against McDonald’s, diverse families living in the neighborhood, representatives of 15 neighborhood associations across the city, young people carrying Palestinian flags… and the entire opposition. Daniel Fernandez, spokesman for the Socialist Group, walks in front of the microphones; Kerwin Martinez, the only FIFA advisor, walks among the demonstrators without making any noise; There are several members of the Cantabristas party, which has no representation in the city council, and Vox’s press officer in Santander takes the opportunity to take pictures of Laura Velasco, one of the far-right party’s three councilors in the municipal corporation, who managed to sneak right behind the sign. The extremist politician takes advantage of her Instagram account to kill two birds with one stone: “Unfortunately, the extreme left wanted to monopolize the demonstration with their Palestinian flags and we had to tell them to take them down, because it is a movement for all Santander residents, not just a few of them.” (And now the truth: No one asked the owners of the Palestinian flags to lower them, and they continued waving them until the end of the protest.)
What we are witnessing this sunny Saturday in the area that sees the greatest influx of tourists and visitors in Santander is not an isolated event. In the parish hall located just 40 meters from one of the squares in which the Santander night is concentrated – Plaza Cañadio – about thirty residents gathered on November 25th. “We’re a bar stock room,” complains a man approaching eighty. The elderly are among the groups that suffer most from the endless succession of hospitality terraces in a neighborhood with narrow sidewalks and no green spaces. In fact, Cruz, another elderly neighbor, distributes some blankets bearing the complaints of “the elderly on the mayor”: free sidewalks, benches, trees, flower boxes, cleaning, noise control… The same complaints from a forty-year-old father who shares with his neighbors that there is no place to play with his children and that when they do they are surrounded by bar terraces.
“We are raising our children in a hostile neighborhood where we teach them that drinking is normal,” explains Isabel Lopez, president of the Bombo-Canadio-Insanche neighborhood association. Lopez reviewed the allegations submitted to the City Council regarding the Noise Action Plan, the 21 proposals related to the new balcony ordinance, or those related to the expensive low-emission zone, which were approved this week in the City Council’s plenary session once the numerous allegations presented were rejected.
A neighborhood meeting is a type of group therapy in which there is consensus: The neighborhood has become unlivable. “This happens because Santander’s model is to be a great bar, regardless of the lives of the neighbors,” complained one attendee.
Some people delete other people’s words because they need to be said. Another concludes: “The problem is not the existing law, but rather the lack of compliance with it and the municipal police not doing anything.”
The license for a McDonald’s located in the same neighborhood also came up in the discussion. Occupying in a market where no shop should be more than 80 square metres, the smells, the enormous opening hours (6am to 2am), the attack on cultural heritage represented by the traditional Puerto Chico market, the early morning gatherings of people to consume… “It’s raining in the wet, the only model for this city is for people to come and have a good time at our expense.”
Just a few days ago, Gemma Igual asked – in response to the controversial balcony law – “to reach a consensus among the rest of Santander and not to slow down the economy and the jobs generated by hospitality companies. I am sure they will put themselves in each other’s shoes and we will come up with the best solution.” But this consensus does not seem workable. Hotel owners, who have 690 balconies dominating the city, say they are limiting business hours to 12:30 p.m. In the morning, on a “normal” day, it means their ruin, and the neighbors see it differently. In addition to requesting a time limit, they request that the concessions not exceed 50% of the enclosed space of the business, and they request sudden noise measurements that put an end to their hell.
“What’s happening in this city is that profits have been privatized but we all pay the expenses,” says one stylish resident on a street near Plaza Bombo. It does not seem fair for the residents of these well-known neighborhoods to pay their taxes in exchange for cleaning the footprint at night. On the same Saturday, before the demonstration against McDonald’s, City Hall machines cleaned Santa Lucia Avenue with pressurized water, a focus of the neighborhood’s protests. “Every Saturday and Sunday they clean it completely… Can you imagine how much it costs? But the profit from the drinks goes to the bars. They have to pay for the mess they leave behind,” says a neighbor on the street.
There are hardly any names in this text, as many of them are well-known people or known PP voters. Even a former senior official in this party’s government regrets the “improvised bottles” on his street, in the middle of the night. “And every time I call the police, they either ignore me or tell me they don’t have staff.”
It was already wine time and the protesters in Puerto Chico dispersed. Some towards their homes. Others to some traditional places on Tetuan Street or Casemiro Sainz Street. It already smells like tails and some disgruntled neighbors are demanding that smell or another so it isn’t replaced by the smell of industrial hamburgers. “Smells like chistura, mortadella and palau!” Classic neighborhood shout out through the portable public address system.
The closed streets are once again occupied by cars, and the statue of La Sardinera, a tribute to the women who sold fish in this neighborhood at the beginning of the 20th century, wears an apron with the McDonald’s logo crossed out. A woman in a wheelchair pushed by her husband. In her hands she still has a small sign that says: “If La Cruz raises her head,” in reference to a very popular figure in the area: Maria Cruz Lopez Moredas, one of those “sardines” who was recycled to become a seller of tiger nuts and sweets. “But I think the city council doesn’t care,” the woman says. “That’s why we already know the mayor as Gemma Medigual.”
At the door of the Puerto Chico market, a merchant and two neighbors analyze the situation: “Do you think the city council will back down?” one of the women asks. “Money is very strong. I doubt it.” The rule of the man with the apron. In front of them, the last of the protesters sings “Santander la Marinera,” the Chima Puente song that has become the city’s popular anthem.