Tenerife Volunteers Transform Public Spaces, Draw Global Media

Volunteers in Tenerife are making public spaces better, and their work has caught the eye of international media. This highlights a great example of how people can get involved, which is different from what you often see in other cities. The group, called Costa del Silencio Limpio, was started by Hannelore Ottevaere from Belgium and includes people from as many as eighteen different countries. We've reported on their efforts before.

For nearly two and a half years, this group has been busy cleaning, maintaining, and beautifying the Costa del Silencio area in southern Tenerife. They've brought the historic Ten-Bel mini-golf course back to life after it was left abandoned for thirty years. They also restored a local park and created an outdoor library there, in a spot where a children's train used to run.

The group's work has even made news in Minneapolis, USA. The local paper, Mill City Times, wrote about Wanda, who is the collective's vice-president. Wanda, who is Puerto Rican and American, lived in Minneapolis for thirty years and was named Volunteer of the Year there in 2022. Now, she's bringing her community-building skills to Tenerife, where she leads this local improvement project.

The group currently has fifty-five members. They meet twice a week, on Tuesday and Friday afternoons, always during the last two hours of daylight. Today, about twenty volunteers will work in the Montaña Amarilla area. They recently finished renovating the Calle Zeus staircase, which is an important spot on the promenade. To help pay for materials, the association is holding a raffle on February 28th. Local businesses are helping out by donating gift vouchers. Even though the group is very diverse, with members from Belgium, Italy, Germany, France, Austria, and Latin America, they would like to welcome more Canarian citizens to join them.