Madrid Rio – 2

This week, we’ll pull out images from a trip to Madrid taken last May – specifically, those of Madrid Rio, with quotes from a Dec 2011 New York Times description:

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Pilar Martínez, who oversaw the park project in the mayor’s office, told me that the official price tag of Madrid Río hovers near $5 billion, all but $500 million of it spent to bury the highway. Twenty-seven miles of new tunnels were dug; countless tons of granite installed to make paths and fountains; some 8,000 pine trees planted. …

Add to this wading pools for toddlers that landlocked Madrid parents already fondly call “the beach,” and a paved plaza, in patterned tiles, large enough to fit a few hundred thousand people.

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“Now people who opened their windows onto the sound of cars, open their windows onto the sound of birds,” is how Ms. Martínez, the Madrid official, put it.