The region of l’Anoia, in Barcelona, has been suffering for years the loss of inhabitants who migrate to Barcelona. In the midst of this trend, the small town of Castellolí, with just 651 inhabitants and less than an hour from Barcelona, has decided to take action with an innovative plan to prevent the town from losing its stores and local life.
We often hear of similar initiatives in towns in the interior of Spain, or in countries such as Italy, but it is not so common to hear of promotions in Barcelona where incentives are offered to “repopulate” a municipality that, as we said, is very close to the city.
Free house, commercial premises and 15,000 euros for recovering a store.
But their situation is critical. Castellolí has been without a grocery store for years. There is only a bakery and a pharmacy, insufficient to meet the needs of the residents who, with a high average age, need to travel by car to nearby towns to do their shopping.
For this reason, the town council has launched an initiative to reactivate commercial activity: it is offering free housing with commercial premises and 15,000 euros for fitting out the premises to anyone who wants to set up a business in the historic building of Cal Peret, located in the heart of the town.
The building combines a local on the first floor and a house on the second floor and was, where, historically, was the grocery store and tobacconist. Until now it was rented, but now it has been emptied, and will be handed over free of rent, although whoever occupies it will have to assume the maintenance costs.
The only requirement is that the store sells zero kilometer products, linked to the nearby natural and agricultural environment, such as the Agricultural Park of the Òdena Basin and the Rural Park of Montserrat.With this measure, Castellolí not only seeks to boost its local economy, but also to attract new residents who contribute to repopulate the town and preserve its rural essence, offering a unique opportunity for those who want to live and undertake in a privileged natural environment.
Whoever wants to sign up, just go to the website of the council and fill out the form to submit your application and start dreaming of a new life at the foot of Montserrat.
Where is Castellolí?
One of the most striking points of the offer is that we are not talking about a village lost in the Pyrenees, but a municipality that is less than an hour from Barcelona, overlooking the massif of Montserrat and in the A2, just after the Bruc, so surely you have passed through there more than once.
To get there there are essentially two options: by bus or by car. By bus you have to take the L0371 (Igualada – Barcelona pel Bruc) that connects Barcelona with Igualada and leaves from Estació de Sants and passes through Maria Cristina or Zona Universitaria before leaving Barcelona. After about 50 minutes, you arrive at Castellolí.
By car it is easier, just follow the A2 road out of Barcelona, direction Bruc and Montserrat, and once past the Bruc, the next town is Castellolí, which will have arrived in 40 minutes.
Near Montserrat it is advisable, obviously, to approach the most magical mountain of Catalonia, which has become a scene of the new Star Wars saga, but also visit the surrounding area where you can find, among others, a luxurious modernist spa of the nineteenth century that now lies abandoned at the foot of the mountain.