Voces del Prado

The Car-Park at the Museo del Prado

Juan Manuel Gómez Agredano, Service Technician for Electricity and Air Conditioning (Electrician), 1972-What's on

The whole of the Jerónimos entrance, the sales-point, the cafeteria … all of that was a street in which cars entered and parked. That was our car-park. There were gardens along the entire ramp, the same as at the Goya Door right up to Los Jerónimos. It was just a piece of open land with gardens. When they began the works in 1980 [the tender was adjudicated in 1975] that was when it was closed off and they dug down to build the machines room. Someone would come at ten in the morning with a small book and stand where the chain was strung across the road and he would be responsible for opening the chain for everyone who came by car, charging them each to enter, because that ticket was really for the car-park and also for the museum. You could enter the museum with the same ticket. But that man first worked in the boiler room; he was really the boilerman, who was responsible for shovelling in the coal in the morning. Then he’d go outside and work in the car-park.