Ildefons Cerdà
Encyclopedia
Centelles
Centelles is a municipality in the comarca of Osona inCatalonia, Spain. It is situated in the upper valley of the Congost River in the south of thecomarca. The municipality is served by the C-17 road...
, December 23, 1815 - Caldas de Besaya, August 21, 1876) was the progressive Catalan
Catalan people
The Catalans or Catalonians are the people from, or with origins in, Catalonia that form a historical nationality in Spain. The inhabitants of the adjacent portion of southern France are sometimes included in this definition...
Spanish urban planner
Urban planning
Urban planning incorporates areas such as economics, design, ecology, sociology, geography, law, political science, and statistics to guide and ensure the orderly development of settlements and communities....
who designed the 19th-century "extension" of Barcelona
Barcelona
Barcelona is the second largest city in Spain after Madrid, and the capital of Catalonia, with a population of 1,621,537 within its administrative limits on a land area of...
called the Eixample
Eixample
The Eixample is a district of Barcelona between the old city and what were once surrounding small towns , constructed in the 19th and early 20th centuries....
.
Biography
Born at CentellesCentelles
Centelles is a municipality in the comarca of Osona inCatalonia, Spain. It is situated in the upper valley of the Congost River in the south of thecomarca. The municipality is served by the C-17 road...
, Catalonia
Catalonia
Catalonia is an autonomous community in northeastern Spain, with the official status of a "nationality" of Spain. Catalonia comprises four provinces: Barcelona, Girona, Lleida, and Tarragona. Its capital and largest city is Barcelona. Catalonia covers an area of 32,114 km² and has an...
, he originally trained as a civil engineer
Civil engineer
A civil engineer is a person who practices civil engineering; the application of planning, designing, constructing, maintaining, and operating infrastructures while protecting the public and environmental health, as well as improving existing infrastructures that have been neglected.Originally, a...
. When the government of the time finally gave in to public pressure and allowed Barcelona's city walls to be torn down, he realized the need to plan the city's expansion so that the new extension
New town
A new town is a specific type of a planned community, or planned city, that was carefully planned from its inception and is typically constructed in a previously undeveloped area. This contrasts with settlements that evolve in a more ad hoc fashion. Land use conflicts are uncommon in new...
would become an efficient and livable place, unlike the congested, epidemic-prone old town within the walls. When he failed to find suitable reference works, he undertook the task of writing one from scratch while designing what he called the 'Eixample', borrowing a few technological ideas from his contemporaries to create a unique, thoroughly modern integrated concept that was carefully considered rather than whimsically designed.
He continued to create projects and improve existing designs throughout his lifetime, as well as to develop his theories taking on larger planning scopes (at regional planning
Regional planning
Regional planning deals with the efficient placement of land use activities, infrastructure, and settlement growth across a larger area of land than an individual city or town. The related field of urban planning deals with the specific issues of city planning...
level), until the very end. In the process, he lost all his family's inheritance and he died a heavily indebted near-pauper, never having been paid for his chief masterpiece, the design of the Barcelona 'Eixample'.
Achievements
He was a multi-faceted man who, in pursuit of his vision, gave up a steady job in the civil engineering service; stood for election and became a member of the CortesCortes Generales
The Cortes Generales is the legislature of Spain. It is a bicameral parliament, composed of the Congress of Deputies and the Senate . The Cortes has power to enact any law and to amend the constitution...
(parliament); drafted useful ground-breaking legislation; drew up an incredibly detailed topographical survey map of Barcelona's surrounding area; and wrote a theoretical treatise to support each of his major planning projects. He actually coined a number of important words in Spanish, including 'urbanización'.
Approach
Sanitary sewer
A sanitary sewer is a separate underground carriage system specifically for transporting sewage from houses and commercial buildings to treatment or disposal. Sanitary sewers serving industrial areas also carry industrial wastewater...
, and the need for seamless movement of people, goods, energy, and information.
His designs belie a network-oriented approach far ahead of his time. His street layout and grid plan
Grid plan
The grid plan, grid street plan or gridiron plan is a type of city plan in which streets run at right angles to each other, forming a grid...
were optimized to accommodate pedestrian
Pedestrian
A pedestrian is a person traveling on foot, whether walking or running. In some communities, those traveling using roller skates or skateboards are also considered to be pedestrians. In modern times, the term mostly refers to someone walking on a road or footpath, but this was not the case...
s, carriages, horse-drawn tram
Tram
A tram is a passenger rail vehicle which runs on tracks along public urban streets and also sometimes on separate rights of way. It may also run between cities and/or towns , and/or partially grade separated even in the cities...
s, urban railway lines (as yet unheard-of), gas
Natural gas
Natural gas is a naturally occurring gas mixture consisting primarily of methane, typically with 0–20% higher hydrocarbons . It is found associated with other hydrocarbon fuel, in coal beds, as methane clathrates, and is an important fuel source and a major feedstock for fertilizers.Most natural...
supply and large-capacity sewers to prevent frequent flood
Flood
A flood is an overflow of an expanse of water that submerges land. The EU Floods directive defines a flood as a temporary covering by water of land not normally covered by water...
s, without neglecting public and private gardens and other key amenities. The latest technical innovations were incorporated in his designs if they could further the cause of better integration, but he also came up with remarkable new concepts of his own, including a logical system of land readjustment that was essential to the success of his project, and produced a thorough statistical analysis of working-class conditions at the time, which he undertook in order to demonstrate the ills of congestion.
Controversy
His plan for Barcelona underwent two major revisions; the second version, approved by the Spanish government at the time, is the one still recognizable in the layout of today's 'Eixample', though the low height of buildings and the gardens within every single city block were soon dispensed with by politicians inclined to cave in to (or perhaps even indulge in) speculation.Only one of the two planned diagonal streets was realized.
The Eixample was and still is inhabited by the well-to-do, instead of integrating classes.
Many of the Catalan architects of his time opposed Cerdà's ideas, even accusing him of promoting socialism.
In the end, though, they designed the Modernist
Modernisme
Modernisme was a cultural movement associated with the search for Catalan national identity. It is often understood as an equivalent to a number of fin-de-siècle art movements, such as Art Nouveau, Jugendstil, Secessionism, and Liberty style, and was active from roughly 1888 to 1911 Modernisme ...
façades that brought fame to the district.
Political developments in Spain
Spain
Spain , officially the Kingdom of Spain languages]] under the European Charter for Regional or Minority Languages. In each of these, Spain's official name is as follows:;;;;;;), is a country and member state of the European Union located in southwestern Europe on the Iberian Peninsula...
and Catalonia
Catalonia
Catalonia is an autonomous community in northeastern Spain, with the official status of a "nationality" of Spain. Catalonia comprises four provinces: Barcelona, Girona, Lleida, and Tarragona. Its capital and largest city is Barcelona. Catalonia covers an area of 32,114 km² and has an...
eventually led to the enshrinement of a revisionist version of how Cerdà secured official approval of his plan.
Cerdà actually drew up his plan under the commission of the then competent authority, the Spanish central government, with the support of the city council. A political reversal led to a change in local government, and the new council sought to pre-empt the previous central government's decision by holding a project competition in 1859, which Cerdà lost; nevertheless, Cerdà's design prevailed, much to the chagrin of the major property owners.
Major works
- Teoría de la Construcción de Ciudades ("Theory of City Construction", 1859), written to support his 1855 preliminary project for the Barcelona Extension.
- Teoría de la Viabilidad Urbana y Reforma de la de Madrid ("Theory of Urban Roadspace and Reform of That of Madrid", 1861), to support his inner-city reform designs for the capital of Spain.
- Teoría del Enlace del Movimiento de las Vías Marítimas y Terrestres ("Theory of the Linkage of movement on Landways and Seaways", 1863), to accompany a Preliminary Project for a road-rail-sea intermodalIntermodal freight transportIntermodal freight transport involves the transportation of freight in an intermodal container or vehicle, using multiple modes of transportation , without any handling of the freight itself when changing modes. The method reduces cargo handling, and so improves security, reduces damages and...
system at the port of Barcelona, evidence of which is conclusive though most of the content has not yet been found. - Teoría General de la Urbanización ("General Theory of Urbanization", 1867), to support his 1859 project for the Barcelona Extension.
- Teoría General de la Rurización ("General Theory of Ruralization")
External links
- Ildefons Cerdà. Personalitat i ideologia
- Biography
- Fifteen articles on Ildefons Cerdà, his work and its impact on the City of Barcelona, Barcelona MetropolisBarcelona MetropolisBarcelona Metrópolis is a magazine of urban information and thought dedicated to monitoring the evolution of the city of Barcelona.Barcelona...
, Autumn 2009.