Contenu du sommaire : Carthagène – Veracruz. Villes-ports dans la mondialisation

Beyond that renewal over time, Cartagena and Veracruz, despite the distance between them, develop strong bonds that their condition of tropical ports where the first europeans landed. Both cities show how modernity is integrated in historically heritage and illustrate contemporary trends to immediate articulation between local and global.

History has granted Cartagena a privileged place in the Caribbean. A perfect fortress for the control of the sea and land, the city flourished in that role. When the port, born of a desire for power and territory, lost its importance, the city declined. We now know, nonetheless, that continuity is more probable than rupture, permanency more common than revolution. The double condition of continuity and rupture is today the most notable characteristic of the Caribbean, interfacing with the world. And thus today Cartagena recovers its historical place. This reflection is inseparable from two events that have an impact on all analysis : the expansion of the Panama Canal with its direct effect on the movement of cargo in the Caribbean Sea and the Gulf of Mexico ; and the renovation of the port of Mariel in Cuba as a port for containers that aspires to become a hub for the region. These factors bring the advantage of concrete facts to the debate : dealing with cargo and containers, docks and depths, the debate becomes material, overshadowing the ideological perspective that has long distracted discussion of urban issues from the physical realities of the cities... a peculiar blindness that has for too long characterized such discussions in Latin America.

Cartagena de Indias in Colombia and Veracruz in Mexico were fortified and bastioned cities that faced the onslaught of piracy and were also major ports in the trade and shipping routes. The common origin of the project to defend Cartagena and Veracruz was the protection plan developed by Juan Bautista and Tiburzio Spannocchi, who commanded the military engineers that worked on the planning and construction of fortifications in the Mediterranean, and whose experiences were fundamental in the protection of American shores. The figure of Bautista Antonelli was essential for the protection plan of Cartagena and Veracruz ; he was the military engineer in charge of defense projects for the New World ports. Bautista Antonelli, architect and military engineer had worked with his brother on the conditioning of terrain and roads for the troops in Portugal. All three were considered experts in the military art of the time.

Historiography tells us that Cartagena de Indias suffered a great decadence and abandon in the 19th century. However in spite of the political ups and downs and the initial exodus of a good number of its elite, in this century Cartagena experienced structural urban changes : it went from being a city divided into two walled enclosures to a more dense and complex city unit and it incorporated the suburban neighbourhoods with permanent residences. The political circumstances and the efforts invested in die infrastructure of basic services marked a categorical difference regarding colonial times and prepared the city for the big changes that would overtake it in the 20th century. The text reconstructs the main interventions and the urban processes in the city centre as well as in the outskirts through the accounts of travellers, the chronicles of the time and file documents.

This article portrays the port of Veracruz at the end of the 19th and beginning of the 20th centuries, the period during which a process of urban transformation was undertaken in an effort to improve the conditions of the notoriously unsanitary environment of the city and port, which was extremely important to Mexican foreign commerce with countries on the Atlantic. At the same time, it analyses the project of urban modernity, the port and sanitation works that addressed the unhealthy conditions and the preponderance of diseases that have characterized the port of Veracruz throughout its history. Examining the modernization carried out during the period known in Mexican historiography as the Porfiriato (the presidential terms of General Porfirio Diaz), the article includes a recounting of public works undertaken not only in the port area but also for the city and its inhabitants. It takes up fundamental examples such as the large harbor works, sanitation and decorative projects in the streets and plazas, permanent improvements in health care institutions and in schools. The most significant diseases of the period and their effects on sanitation policies and daily life of the port are also discussed.

The editors of Villes en Parallèle interviewed Burgel and the conversation dealt with the urban system of Latin America and its importance in globalization. Villes en Parallèle. In the 16th century, Spain developed a broad and complex system of cities in the New World. In the 19th century, this system drove the movement for Independence. In Latin America the Independence was an urban revolution. Curiously, in the 20th century, the century of cities, it was rural life in Latin America, as opposed to urban life, that fueled civil wars within the newly independent nations. Thus we had the Mexican Revolution, the Cuban Revolution from the Sierra Maestra, the rural guerrillas. Guy Burgel : The theme is discordance in history. We are accustomed to seek, and to find, rationalities in political history but more and more I think that history is made up of disharmonies and discordance. The Spanish empire raised a system of cities in the course of a couple decades during an era that was not urban, and the aggregate of civilizations remained rural. If, inversely, we take the contemporary period, where urbanization dominates the scene, the only great nation that created cities professing an urban ideology was the Soviet Union. To the discordance of facts, one therefore adds ideological discordance, and I do not want to overlook a particular characteristic of the Latin American city, in relation to other civilizations that participated in the same process of globalization of the city.

Since the 16th century, Veracruz in Mexico and Cartagena in Columbia have been two ports of great importance, from which the Spanish colonies' products, in particular the gold and silver of Latin America, were shipped. From that developed their relationship with other port cities such as Marseilles, their patrimony, their urban architecture, and their place in maritime commerce. Veracruz and Cartagena are port cities directly linked to international traffic across the Atlantic Ocean, as well as Seville, which previously shared the same conditions. Marcel Roncayolo One must reaffirm the primordial importance of Geography when considering what is called the uniqueness of places, which can eventually be linked to the notion of legacy. In modern times, great speculation arose around new spaces of the port in Marseilles. This process created difficulties and tensions between the port and the city over the interests of the port and those of urban development in search of available space. One must also note, on the other hand, that Marseilles, a commercial port, was interested above all in the Caribbean, given that some of the Caribbean islands were French colonies.

Few cities in America have performed for so long time such a significant role in the relations between the old and the new continent as Veracruz has. For over four centuries this gateway and port has seen pass through it communications, commerce, news and travellers on their way to the capital of the Viceroyalty of New Spain or, on the contrary, on their way to Europe or the Iberian Peninsula. Veracruz has been the subject of the stories and travel diaries of soldiers, priests, adventurers, explorers or scientists, as well as of the graphic documentation that illustrate these accounts or that is prepared independently, through engravings, oil and tempera paintings or photographic sequences. Reading chronicles and stories are a measure of the growth and the evolution of the city, registering the relevant transformations that took place in it or, on the other hand, the inertia and apathy to resolve problems that plagued it through time.

What makes it so remarkable and unique Cartagena despite the apparent paradoxes and socioeconomic inequalities that exposes its urban landscape. To answer this question one chooses to address some urban events that are part of your current physical shape, considering they give it structure and characteristics that support in that notoriety. They are : its location, its urban layout, its equipment and its streets with his domestic architecture, and practices. We believe that these facts while collecting history, memory and everyday life of its people, reveal the struggle between his request for preservation, the daily life of its residents and the actions of modernity and globalization by placing it in the zenith of a tourist market, which in turn represents the most financial support, the appropriate according to their purposes. Each of these urban artifacts from examining specific traits that account for certain paradoxes that open the way to think its uniqueness. The successful development relies primarily on bibliographies related to the history of the city, its urban and architectural setting and to some literary production that have taken such different narratives scenario, which emerges in his poetry, which has inspired the guiding paradox analysis.

The urban layout of the city of Veracruz corresponds to the one it had when the city was founded for the fourth time in 1599. The place is the same as the first founding undertaken by Cortés in the place where they disembarked in 1519. Three months on it was moved to the north shore, next to an indigenous village named Quiahuiztlán. Subsequently it was moved again in 1524 close to the mouth of the Río de los Colibries, much closer to the port. Lastly, in 1599, it came back to the initial place, the place where it remains today. The urban plan is more similar to the first Spanish foundations in the New World as was the case for Santo Domingo, Panama, Puerto Rico and Santiago de Cuba. All throughout the 16th century that urban model evolved into a rigorous one with square blocks. However, the city of Veracruz did not include this type of urban grid.

The settlers of the Jicaltepec-Zopilote area arrived at the Mexican coasts in 1833, when Stéphan Guenot took some families into the area to colonize in a pacific manner this part of the tropic of Veracruz. Their main activity was to cultivate with art coffee and vanilla as they imported from Paris the artificial fertilisation method for the vanilla flower. During a good many years the coffee and vanilla from Jicaltepec and San Rafael were greatly valued and esteemed in the French markets, a fact that propelled the migration of many families from the Northeast of this country to these localities in the North of Veracruz ; it is in this way that they left their seal, not only in regards to agriculture, but in the domain of architecture and culture as well.

From the beginning of the Conquest in the 16th century until the consolidation of Columbian Independence (19th century) and the subsequent freeing of African slaves in Cartagena de Indias and its environs, key moments shaped the attitudes and adjustments of those forced immigrants. The drum became once again an important instrument of a musical tradition — an instrument of communication and pleasure, used both to announce death and to invite enjoyment of life in bunde (a local musical genre) and, perhaps, to encourage the seeking of freedom. A brotherhood of slaves was established in councils with music and dance, generating a sense of identity and belonging to the nations from which they came, creating the Afro-Columbian cultural imprint. During the era of Independence and founding of the Republic, the cultural heritage of this ancestral sub-Saharan current from Cartagena was mixed and integrated into the roots of the indigenous Indo-Americans and Spaniards, giving material and spiritual form to the people of the today's Columbian Caribbean society.

With the encounter of two worlds in the Caribbean, there flourished a musical form of the 16th century called the espinela, which gave voice to die Spanish soldier in the encampments of the New Granada conquerors. Accompanied by the guitar, the Andalusian verses were solace for far-away Europe, but also the first Hispanic literary forms to take root in these lands. It was in the Caribbean region of Colombia (New Andalusia) that this phenomenon gathered strength since it was settled by Spaniards from the cities of Seville, Cordoba, Cadiz, and Ronda, for the most part expelled from Spain by Catholic kings and known for their strong Saracen roots and age-old tradition of rural minstrels. The décima, child of the Golden Age of Spain, replaced the romantic verse as the lyrical medium for Spanish oral narratives in the New World. However, in spite of its widespread legacy in Columbian Caribbean culture, the décima has recently shown signs of decline. The ultimate problem for the Columbian Caribbean décima is its exhaustion, and a losing struggle to avoid extinction.

There are various theories about the origin of Columbian cumbia. It turns out that it is difficult to even define exactly what is meant by that musical genre. This article will take a look at the legends and some of the documents that deal with the rise of what is known today as cumbia. It will focus on the most widespread and accepted theory, according to which this rhythm originated from the union of Spanish, African and indigenous influences in the city of Cartagena de Indias during colonial times. In spite of the fact that there are multiple theories, it can be ascertained that the term cumbia and its musical significance are the result of an ethnic mixture that is still reflected today among the Columbian people.

The following text is a synthesis of a report presented to the United Nations Project for Development-UNESCO, regarding a possible Heritage Management Plan that the Colombian authorities would present as a result of the city of Cartagena being declared a World Heritage site. The experience was very interesting because it allowed the possibility to understand the necessary evolution of UNESCO's vision in order to validate the declarations starting with the integration of a comprehensive urban look that would go beyond the monumental heritage. The analysis of the plans and the projects undertaken through the years in the Historical Area of Cartagena was able to establish the evolution of the legal norms for protection and the theoretical concepts of evaluation and classification included in the projects. The weaknesses that were found in some of these concepts allowed the subsequent elaboration of recommendations to incorporate an integral urban vision for the protection of the heritage.

In the political period known Maximato, which runs from 1929-1934, architect Carlos Contreras planning proposals were introduced in a State program. Thereby applied some modern urban planning strategies, including legislation enacted , created specialized agencies, their tools were used and their concepts were adopted, such as the same planning, zoning and national, regional and urban scales. During that time the first projects were prepared for the planning of the Republic of Mexico, its cities and ports, including Acapulco and Veracruz. Veracruz would become the first port of Mexico, the project would achieve better facilities for the commercial movement, develop tourism and regenerate environemental conditions. In its program, Contreras took the notion of region, which for political reasons could not develop, the postulated «before planning study», the formulation of master plan, and aerial foto mosaics. This paper will give an account of how, in 1929, was aproached the planning of the Port of Veracruz raised by Contreras, using strategies of modern town planning.

The city and port of Veracruz, meeting point and cultural exchange forum in Mexico and the world since its origins, integrates and expresses a very significant sample of the influences and the reinterpretations of architecture that, through varied modern expressions was rehearsed all along the 20th century. Its most emblematic works have not surrendered their originality and a will to encapsulate at different stages an identity based on the facets of a cultural syncretism that is unmistakable. Therefore, as a door to the nation that faces the Gulf of Mexico and the Caribbean basin, the main buildings in Veracruz recognize the desire for modernization undertaken at different moments in time that corresponded to industrialization, the consequences of the Mexican Revolution and the progressive internationalization. With the presence of architects and engineers that came from diverse geographical zones, the buildings in Veracruz point to a very interesting set of samples of adaptation to climactic conditions through a series of unchanging elements that point to the existence of a local, jarocha architecture a term that designates as well the local associated with culture on this coastal strip in Mexico.

The entrepreneur Manuel Suárez undertook a good number of projects in Veracruz, most notably those in which a group of young exiled Spanish architects took part. Their architectural presence in the city arises from various sources and motives beyond the simple economic benefits usually attributed to businessmen, as clearly demonstrated by the quality of the results, especially in the works of Jesús Martí and Enríque Segarra. The coincidençe of personalities and circumstances in these outstanding projects is reflected in architecture that acknowledges the tropical nature of the port and its surroundings.

The situation of Cartagena as a port in an exceptionally protected bay, its architectural tradition and stonework of walls and towers, and the natural shoreline ecosystem which has been conserved and protected, are vital elements for the city's development and a challenge for the future. The absence of usable urban land, lack of regulation, poverty, and inability of the authorities to control the impact of displaced populations have led to the devastation of mangroves on the shore and buffer zones, along with the expansion of hotels and upper-class urban development. Fulfillment of the dream of Cartagena as a river port as well as sea port has resulted in the damaging effects of converting its bay into an estuary. The coral reef has died and every day the Dique Delta is filled with sediments — two million cubic meters per year — dangerously affecting the photic zone and navigation. The Land Use Plan (Decree 0977 of 2001) projects the recovery of the natural heritage of flora and fauna for its sustainable use and promotion of eco-tourism, reducing land use conflicts, and advocating an appropriate management plan for the watershed.

Veracruz is the beginning of the history of our country, says Carlos Fuentes ; it is where Mexico originally connected with the world, the open door through which travelers arrived, the entry point for Hernán Cortés, Tata Vasco and Maximilian of Hapsbuig, the port through which Porfirio Diaz left Mexico to his exile in France. In recent years, the Port of Veracruz has been invigorated due to its strategic location in the central zone of the Gulf of Mexico, the modernization of its infrastructure, and the improvement of its multi-modal communications as the main port of Mexico to the Atlantic. However it also confronts a serious limitation today in regard to its capacity to receive and distribute cargo ; its expansion to the north has been projected since than ten years ago. Environmental problems related to lack of investment in harbor infrastructure have delayed this expansion and now it is absolutely necessary since the ports of the Caribbean and the Panama Canal have undergone very important transformations of their infrastructures.