Spanish City Structure: Evolution and Urban Challenges

Spanish City Structure: Three Key Areas

Spanish cities exhibit complex urban plans that can be structured into three distinct areas:

1. The Urban Core (Casco Urbano)

a) Site and Situation

This section examines the geographical placement and context of the city's oldest parts.

b) Analysis of the Urban Plan

• Walls (Middle Ages): Historically served defensive, health, or fiscal functions. Their conservation is a key aspect of urban heritage.
• Plan Type: Observe subsequent amendments and transformations. This includes pre-irregular layouts, industrial renewal, internal reforms (such as Madrid's Gran Vía), and renewal policies driven by land profitability.

c) Analysis of the Plot

Often characterized as closed (typical of walled cities and growth stemming from ecclesiastical confiscation), these areas are dense, designed to maximize space utilization.

d) Building Analysis

Includes the presence of historical monuments, progressive verticalization over time, patterns of deterioration and renovation, and notable contrasts between different neighborhoods.

e) Land Uses

An analysis of traditional land uses and their evolution towards tertiarization, where the service sector becomes dominant.

f) Current Problems and Solutions

• Physical deterioration of streets and houses.
• Social issues within the community.
• Environmental concerns, including urban microclimate, atmospheric contamination, solid waste management (RSU), and noise pollution.
• Excessive tertiarization, leading to a lack of diverse urban functions.

2. The Expansion Areas (Ensanche)

a) Causes of Urban Expansion

Occurring primarily in the second half of the nineteenth century, this expansion was driven by significant natural population growth and rapid industrialization.

b) Different Areas of the Industrial City

• Bourgeois Expansion:
  • Examples: Madrid (Carlos María de Castro, 1860), Barcelona (Ildefons Cerdà, 1859).
  • Purpose: Urban growth catering to the bourgeoisie.
  • Plan: Typically a regular grid pattern.
  • Layout: Characterized by low density.
  • Buildings: Grand palaces and villas.
  • Land Uses: Primarily bourgeois residential.
• Labor-Industrial Districts:
  • Purpose: Housing for employed workers (often due to rural exodus) near industrial installations.
  • Plan: Often disorganized, resulting from private plot development.
  • Plot: Closed and dense.
  • Buildings: Small-sized, low-quality housing (frequently multi-story apartments).
  • Land Uses: Residences, industries, workshops, and warehouses.
• Garden Districts:
  • Origin: Influenced by the Cheap Housing Law (1911) and naturalistic, hygienic ideas (e.g., Ebenezer Howard).
  • Purpose: Providing housing for the proletariat.
  • Buildings: Family housing at different levels and prices (e.g., Arturo Soria's Linear City concept).

c) Existing and Potential Problems and Solutions

• Aging of buildings, requiring modernization and structural updates.
• Deterioration and lack of services in working-class neighborhoods, necessitating the provision of services and remodeling of the most valued areas.
• Dysfunctional, aged, and deteriorated old industrial areas, requiring renewal for tertiary or residential uses.

3. The Urban Periphery

a) Causes of Periphery Growth

Driven by continued population growth, rural exodus, industrialization, a tendency towards decentralization, and the desire for more economical suburban residences.

b) Different Areas on the Periphery

• Residential Areas:
  • Slums (1950s): A result of rural exodus, characterized by illegal land occupation and self-built homes, often lacking official urban planning.
  • Official Protection Housing (1940s-1960s): State-promoted housing, often with an open layout (e.g., H-shaped blocks), sometimes irregular in design.
  • Apparently Detached Housing (1980s): Reflects the middle-class desire for contact with nature, facilitated by increased automobile use, featuring open layouts.
• Areas of Economic Activity:
  • Industrial or equipment zones, which are a direct result of actual decentralization from the city core.

c) Problems and Solutions

• In Residential Areas:
  • Slums: Requiring eradication and the provision of social housing.
  • Official promotion and private neighborhoods: Facing physical deterioration and a lack of services, necessitating rehabilitation and equipping.
• In Areas of Economic Activity:
  • Deterioration: Requiring rehabilitation and reuse for new purposes.
  • Poor provision of services: Demanding improved infrastructure and service supply.