In an interview with Diario Libre the new mayor of Santo Domingo East, Manuel Jimenez, reaffirmed his opposition to the mega bus terminal the Medina administration is building on land of the Mirador del Este Park. Jimenez had campaigned against the bus station[KR3] and won the municipal election on 15 March 2020 with a 59.7% of the vote against the government candidate. Jimenez insists the station’s construction violates the Constitution of the Republic, as well as municipal and environment laws. It also has been ordered to stop by three rulings from the Superior Administrative Court and the Constitutional Cour
Jimenez says the laws ban the construction of anything that is 500 meters from a protected area, including the buffer area.
The Ministry of Public Works chose to build the mega bus terminal in what was previously the parking for the Parque Mirador del Este, right in front of an auditorium for 5,000 persons and next to the handball and tennis pavilions. The Mirador del Este Park was the site for the 2003 Pan American Games.
Jimenez complains that there were so many other alternate sites. Why did it have to be there? He said the promoters argued it is on the route of everyone, and the land did not have to be purchased, even when in the original budget there were funds to purchase the land, he told Diario Libre.
Jimenez criticized that the project was forcefully built without an environmental impact study.
Public Works Minister Ramon Pepin defended the construction in another interview with Diario Libre. He said there will be no fueling at the terminal, nor mechanic repair shops, nor will the buses overnight there. He said the buses will only pick up and drop off passengers. He said that every day more than 67,000 vehicles enter Santo Domingo. Of those, 9,000 are buses that will no longer have to continue to the National District. The terminal is built to serve as a connecting point for interurban and urban transport.
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Diario Libre
Diario Libre
10 June 2020