Buenos Aires city, the nature beneath

For many of you, topography may be an unfamiliar concept. It refers to the configuration of the natural physical features of an area. Someone could say that it is “the shape of the terrain” but it involves deep complex relations and interactions between a large number of natural factors. This is why learning about the topography where a city is settled on can tell the citizens so much about its present reality and the challenges to come. Ignoring topography can lead to serious consequences, as it is the case of Buenos Aires.



Since the beginning, topography has played a determinant role in the creation and development of the city. When the first settlers arrived in these latitudes, they searched for the best location to establish their camp: it had to be near the shore, in a high spot in the terrain to provide shelter and safety from rain and floods, and to be on guard against possible attacks from the continent and from the river. That place is thought to be where ‘Plaza de Mayo’ is today.

As time went by the marginal colony grew bigger. Roads were opened into the territory following higher lands to secure trade and supply traffic despite climate hazards. That particular strategy can be pictured as a hand: the palm is the city from which the fingers -roads- are born, pointing into the continent to reach its wealth.

As a result, the growing population started settling their residences down near those roads, avoiding lower ground, meadows, water streams, etc. This is how real estate market was born. Wealthy people owned the best lands and the rest of the people had to find less favourable places to live in. That behaviour has persisted until today: property value is higher in the north-central area of the city (higher lands, well connected, good infrastructure) and it decreases towards the south, a historically avoided area due to its lower terrain and periodical floods from the Riachuelo.

Long years passed, the colony became a city and the city became a metropolis. Roads and railways kept growing, followed by population, and little by little the spaces between the ‘fingers’ were filled by the city. Streams and rivers were put into underground pipes; lands were covered with buildings; roads were asphalted, trees and vegetation shrank. Even the coast was altered: meadows were filled in to reclaim land from the De la Plata river. The progress irreversibly changed the topography to fulfil the desires of the people: progress.

Nowadays, as we were saying, the city has taken over the landscape, has covered it, ‘filled’ it; natural features pass unnoticed for most of us, the city shape and trace are thought as a result of planners' design. The truth is that city planning is a recent complex concept, deeply attached to the economic influence and benefit of real estate business. From the many city design decisions made by planners which are originated in natural topographic conditions, only a few are carried out by politicians and too many ignored by private investors. It has proved to have catastrophic consequences: many unfavourable areas have been urbanised leaving the resident population vulnerable to floods, unprovided of correct water supply, without enough sewer infrastructure, lacking of mobility access, etc.

As for the future of the city and us, the citizens, we had better learn where our city is settled and take action in its future development, or we can let real estate decide for us, as we are used to. We must demand our representatives and the public control body the compliance of laws which involves planning matters. Remember that the Urban Planning Code contemplates the shared participation in public assemblies of neighbours and government to decide on planning issues.

Visual Memory of Buenos Aires

 

 Translated text coming soon.