El Shute has his dos centavos' worth...

If there's one thing Susana deserves some support on it is this displacement of the 'Feria del Libro'. As an avid and diversified reader in both Spanish and English - with noted bibliomaniac tendencies some might allege  - I can honestly say I have almost never felt the urge to graze this particular set of troughs. (Though I did pick up Gloria Álvarez's polemic on populism after listening to her plugging it live at the feria last year.) 

Most of the tomes on offer are utter junk, the sort of stuff you could buy any day of the week at the Mariposa. Claims that this annual event adds to the intellectual life of the city are spurious. 

But the real issue here is that the Muni has to be consistent - one of the main complaints levied by avuncular Dr Parada on Thursday about the pedestrianisation of the Calle del Arco. 

If they wish to de-commercialise the Parque Central, then they have to re-locate the book-sellers along with the pestering típico peddlers, no matter how much faux-intellectual bravado they display.  

Our mayor has to be prepared to piss EVERYONE off uniformly- the stuffy conservative petty-elite, the parasitical gringos, the invasive riff-raff from the provinces...everyone. 

And she has to stop trying to use a sledgehammer to crack a nut. Massive fines directed at all those who flout her directives will get her nowhere. Far more than an architect or urban planner, right now La Antigua needs an economist in its top job. 

This is because by its very nature Antigua benefitted a long time ago from up front contributions from architects and urban planners, and what it needs in the contemporary environment is an administration that understands the complex and sophisticated web of incentives and disincentives that needs to be spun to get the place functioning properly again.