The construction of a three-kilometre walk-way already has been completed, opening before the tourist season in July this year, and now the crowds have gone, the second part of the project to remodel Monte Gordo's seaside area can commence.
The old beachside businesses, 19 of them, that faithfully have served generations of tourists and locals, are to be torn down and new, purpose built buildings erected 'before next summer.'
Conceição Cabrita, the mayor of Vila Real de Santo António, said that the plan is for a May 2018 opening for the new-style Monte Gordo beach area.
This project is part of the Vilamoura to Vila Real Coastal Development Plan which involves the Portuguese Environment Agency, the Port Authority and the council.
Sebastião Teixeira, the much-maligned president of the Portuguese Environment Agency in the Algarve, said the coastal plan was published in 2005 and that "we have been implementing the plan slowly because it involves a lot of consultation. On the beach of Monte Gordo, we are in the final stages and the idea is to ‘requalify’ the Algarve coast globally.”
Desite the 12 year delay at Monte Gordo, it has Teixeira’s trademark zeal in ‘requalifying the Algarve coastline globally,’ that has led him into barrages of adverse publicity after, for example, the ruination of Dona Ana beach in Lagos, once voted one of the top beaches in the world and now a testament to lack of environmental awareness and unnecessary intervention.
Monte Gordo’s beach concession owners will be picking up the bill for their new buildings but most are sanguine - there already has been an increase in passing trade with the new walk-way in operation so they soon should recoup their money.
The total cost of the Monte Gordo beach plan is €10 million, to include the walk-way and the demolition and construction of the beach concession buildings.
Originally, the demolition work was planned to start in February this year but as this was such a stupid idea, work was postponed until after the summer season.
