Planning Latin America's Capital Cities

«o Planning Latin America’s Capital Cities, 1850-1950 cs edited by Arturo Almandoz First published 2002 by Routledge 11 New Fetter Lane, London EC4P 4EE Simultaneously published in the USA and Canada by Routledge, 29 West 35th Street, New York, NY 10001 Routledge is an imprint of the Taylor & Francis Group © 2002 Selection and editorial matter: Arturo Almandoz; individual chapters: the contributors Typeset in Garamond by PNR Design, Didcot, Oxfordshire Printed and bound in Great Britain by St Edmundsbury Press, Bury St Edmunds, Suffolk This book was commissioned and edited by Alexandrine Press, Oxford All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reprinted or reproduced or utilised in any form or by any electronic, mechanical or other means, now known or hereafter invented, including photocopying and recording, or in any informa tion storage or retrieval system, without permission in writing from the publishers. The publisher makes no representation, express or implied, with regard to the accuracy of the information contained in this book and cannot accept legal responsibility or liability for any errors or omissions that may be made. British Library Cataloguing in Publication Data A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library Library o f Congress Cataloging in Publication Data A catalog record for this book has been requested ISBN 0-415-27265-3 ca Contents *o Foreword by Anthony Sutcliffe vii The Contributors ix Acknowledgements xi 1 Introduction 1 Arturo Almandoz 2 Urbanization and Urbanism in Latin America: from Haussmann to CIAM 13 Arturo Almandoz I CAPITALS OF THE BOOMING ECONOMIES 3 Buenos Aires, A Great European City 45 Ramón Gutiérrez 4 The Time of the Capitals. Rio de Janeiro and Sao Paulo: Words, Actors and Plans 75 Margaretb da Silva Pereira 5 Cities within the City: Urban and Architectural Transfers in Santiago de Chile, 1840-1940 109 Fernando Pérez Oyarzun and José Rosas Vera II EARLY VICEREGAL CAPITALS 6 The Urban Development of Mexico City, 1850-1930 139 Carol McMichael Reese 7 The Script of Urban Surgery: Lima, 1850-1940 170 Gabriel Ramón III THE CARIBBEAN RIM AND CENTRAL AMERICA 8 Havana, from Tacón to Forestier 193 Roberto Segre 9 Caracas: Territory, Architecture and Urban Space 214 Lorenzo González Casas 10 Urbanism, Architecture, and Cultural Transformations in San José, Costa Rica, 1850-1930 241 Florencia Quesada 11 Conclusions 271 Arturo Almandoz Index 275 Chapter 3 Buenos Aires, A Great European City Ramón Gutiérrez ‘Buenos Aires, a great European city’ - these This chapter describes the way in which words, spoken by George Clemençeau in 1911, this vision was achieved, tracing the ideas and would mark the climax of the efforts made by work which have led to Buenos Aires being Argentina’s elite leaders in their search to achieve recognized even today as the most European a vision which was civilized and ultimately city in Latin America. unmistakeably European.1 B u en o s A ir e s : F r o m t h e C apita l o f t h e V ic e r o y a l t y o f Rio d e L a P la ta t o t h e ‘G ra n Al d e a ’ The city of Santa María de los Buenos Aires, colonies and Brazil. As the capital of this vice founded for the second time in 1580 on its royalty, the city would serve as the site for present site, became the politicial capital of important public buildings bringing together the viceroyalty of Río de la Plata, which had governmental bodies and public amenities been created by the Spanish Crown in 1776 such as "the Aduana (Customs), Correos (Post (figure 3.1). As political capital, the city’s Office),‘Renta de Tobaco (Tobacco Tax Office), strategic, importance as a port would be in the Consulado de Buenos Aires (Buenos Aires creased and it would be in a position to deal Consulate), Colegios;Reales-(Royal Colleges), with the serious border conflicts which the Plaza de'Toros'fthe Bull-Ring),-the Corral existed in the region between the kings of de Comedias~(Comedy Theatre) and the Recova Spain and Portugal.2 de Comercio (Trading Market). These helped The creation of this viceroyalty was intended to enhance a modest| urban landscape where to strengthen urban growth, and therefore the the main recreation site was the short tree-lined openness granted by the Free Trade Ordinace avenue along the river and beside the old fort, of 1778 was needed to legalize methods of at that time the residence of the Viceroys. exchange and so put paid to the traditional The rapid mercantile expansion that brought smuggling carried out between the Spanish about the opening of the port, together with Figure 3.1 Buenos Aires in 1650. Plan by a French spy named Massiac, who gave it to Vauban. Published by Charlevoix in 1756. (Source-. Archivo del Centro de Documentación de Arquitectura Latinoamericana, CEDODAL) the geopolitical importance of the enclave for Although reminders of the war were the dominance of the southern part of the evident in Buenos Aires during the first years continent - demonstrated by two unsuccessful after Independence, the city soon began to attempts at invasion by the British in 1806 establish itself, successively extending its internal and 1807 - made possible the emergence of a borders onto those of the indigenous people, Creole sector who would rapidly seize their which at the end of the colonial era were Independence from the Spanish crown - as little more than 40 kilometres from the city. soon as Napoleon’s invasion led to the fall of King Fernando VII in 1808. Urban Projects of the Nineteenth Century For several of the leaders of the newly inde Departamento de Ingenieros y Agrimensores pendent country the Spanish grid layout rep (Engineering and Surveying Department) resented an obstacle that should be modified sought ‘scientific’ prestige in its geometrical while, paradoxically, the recently created designs.3 It is also curious that the urban expansion of European cities in the nine large part of Bernardino Rivadavia’s muni teenth century followed the positive experience cipal administration as Minister and President of the American checkerboard design (for (1826-1827), and that of the groups searching example Plan Castro in Madrid and Plan Cerdá for political unification. They aimed at repro in Barcelona). ducing in Buenos Aires the image of a country The grid as an urban symbol became part they aspired to be more progressive, even if of nineteenth-century planning thought and that meant that it might become smaller. At of the first development projects in Buenos that time thoughts such as ‘the bad thing Aires on the Río de la Plata; for example that about the country is its size . .’ or ‘. carried out by the English businessman beyond the port, progress is impossible’ were Micklejohn in 1824, which showed signs of voiced. In the midst of such debate (between the desire to ‘square’ that curious ‘new town’. unionists, federalists and oligarchs), Buenos The idea of Buenos Aires as the centre was Aires was confirmed as the prestigious icon of accepted and, at the same time, a new and spec an Europeanized elite. ulative division of the land into lots introduced.4 In the second decade of the nineteenth However, the ambitions of the leaders to century, the arrival of English, French and transform the city into a mirror image of a Italian technicians brought in by Rivadavia, European metropolis, prevailed during a would emphasize this desire to create a Figure 3.2 Conventillo located in a southern neighborhood in Buenos Aires by 1890. (Source-. Archivo del Centro de Documentación de Arquitectura Latinoamericana, CEDODAL) European and cosmopolitan country, and this which reveals the squat nature of the city would, in itself, ensure progress and overcome whose urban landscape was still dominated colonial backwardness. A plan drawn by James by church towers and domes. The example of Bevans around 1828, reveals a city with a industrial architecture was introduced in checkerboard design, rectangular blocks and 1857 when the roof of the Teatro Colón (Colon several plazas designed diagonally. This was a Theatre) was imported from Dublin. Carlos foretaste of the imagery or vision of the new Enrique Pellegrini, the French engineer who cultural leaders. However, a large part of this conceived this plan, indicated that from then enthusiasm for the renewal of the urban on the country’s progress would be measured image was shipwrecked on the stormy seas of by its consumption of iron. the local bureaucracies, political discontinuity, The scarcity of basic urban services was the civil wars, and the lack of funds to carry notorious. The search for a supply of potable out some of the models coming from abroad, water from artesian wells went on for decades which showed little viability in the Argentine without being able to meet the demands of a context. city with rapid commercial growth and a There are obvious signs by which to large immigrant population from 1860. From measure the slowness of certain technological 1856, with the municipal organization transformations and to explain why these centralized, work on the cutting, surfacing changes were barely started in the second half and paving of the streets began. Nevertheless, of the nineteenth century. The first three- problems vital for the city, such as adequate storey house was built in Buenos Aires in 1838, port installations, were still unsolved.5 Transformations of the Urban Fabric In the meantime, the city grew dramatically, the southern area of the port became densely with the surrounding territory being divided occupied, and this led to a type of building into square plots, subdividing the colonial known as the conventillo (tenement) or the parcelas (plots) and defining new types of neighbourhood house where each room housed housing.

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