Hundreds of people queued at Barcelona's Fira de Montjuïc exhibition hall on Wednesday morning, 6 May 2026, to access Spain's migrant regularisation scheme. Some applicants had been waiting since 6am, according to those in line.
Pavilion 2 of the venue opened at 10am to help streamline procedures. It allows applicants to request appointments and time slots for processing residency applications, and to obtain information about the scheme. From next week, the process will also extend to Barcelona residents not officially registered on the municipal census. These applicants will need to provide documentation proving their continued presence in the city, and their procedures will also be handled at the Fira de Montjuïc site.
City officials described this rollout as 'phase two' of the migrant regularisation process.
Easing Administrative Pressure
Spain opened an extraordinary migrant regularisation process in April, offering an estimated half a million people the chance to formalise their legal status. In Catalonia, up to 150,000 people are expected to benefit from the initiative, which is open until the end of June.
Since the process began, offices in Barcelona processing applications have been inundated, with long queues forming that stretch for numerous blocks. The council has issued 17,000 vulnerability reports, with 10,000 online and 7,000 in person, and 94,000 residency registration certificates.
The new measures were announced on Tuesday by deputy mayor Raquel Gil, social rights manager Marta Clari, and social action commissioner Sonia Fuertes at a press conference at City Hall. From Thursday onwards, the new venue will operate from 8am to 10pm. Gil said the aim is to "de-escalate" demand at citizen service offices (OAC) and to "improve waiting times and quality of service."
Centralising Services
City officials hope the new site will ease pressure after queues of up to one kilometre formed outside an OAC Office in Plaça Sant Miquel. The council had previously set up four support points for migrant regularisation. The latest opened on 28 April on Carrer Miquel Bleach, in the Hostafrancs neighbourhood. This joined three existing sites: the immigrant support service SAIER on Carrer Tarragona and two citizen service offices at Sant Miquel and Monumental.
Gil added that from 15 May, the city aims to centralise procedures at the Montjuïc venue, the SAIER office on Carrer Tarragona, and the office in Hostafrancs. This will allow standard services to resume at other citizen service offices.
