Ponce Historic Zone


The Ponce Historic Zone is a historic district in downtown Ponce, Puerto Rico, consisting of buildings, plazas and structures with distinctive architectures such as Neoclásico Isabelino and the Ponce Creole, a local architectural style developed between the 19th- and early 20th-centuries. The zone goes by various names, including Traditional Ponce, Central Ponce, Historic Ponce, and Ponce Historic District. Although not yet listed in the National Register of Historic Places, the Ponce Historic Zone was added to the Puerto Rico Register of Historic Sites and Zones on February 2, 1989.

Location

The historic zone is located in what is commonly called Ponce Pueblo – the central downtown and oldest area of the city. While there are several roads that lead to it, the most common point of entry is via PR-1, which becomes the Miguel Pou Boulevard, and then into the one-way Isabel Street, leading to the center of Ponce at the Plaza Las Delicias.
In addition to Plaza Las Delicias, with its unique Parque de Bombas and Nuestra Señora de la Guadalupe Cathedral, the zone includes landmarks such as Ponce City Hall, Armstrong-Poventud Residence, Ponce High School, and Panteón Nacional Román Baldorioty de Castro. Numerous other attractions in this historic area are listed in the NRHP, such as Banco de Ponce, Casa Paoli, and Casa de la Masacre. Others, such as Teatro Fox Delicias, Teatro La Perla, Plaza de Mercado, Hotel Meliá, and Paseo Atocha are not listed but possess significant historical value. Street corners in most of this zone have chamfered corners, typical of Barcelona, Spain.
A map of the area covered by the Ponce Historic Zone is available from the government of the municipality of Ponce.

History

Carmelo Rosario Natal has linked the origins of the Ponce Historic Zone to an event that took place on 8 June 1893. On that date, La Gaceta de Puerto Rico, the insular government's official periodical, published an edict of the Governor of Puerto Rico, Antonio Daban y Ramirez de Arellano, that mandated municipal authorities throughout the Island to divide, for fire control purposes, a town's urban center into three zones: stone-built, build with fire resistant materials, and built with combustible materials. No structure could be built, rebuilt or restored within a minimum of 50 meters from the town's central square unless it was stoned-built or it was to be upgraded to a stone-built structure. According to Rosario Natal, those were the roots of what almost 70 years later would be called the Ponce Historic Zone.
On 20 June 1960, governor Luis Muñoz Marín amended the law regarding historic zones, making it possible for Ponce to be included in such category. On 6 June 1962, the Zone was officially designated as such, and initially included only the center core of the city, but it was later expanded to include a much larger area. On that date the Instituto de Cultura Puertorriqueña, with the concurrence of the Puerto Rico Planning Board, approved a resolution creating the Zone. The Zone included a list of 22, mostly contiguous areas, including specific buildings, structures, plaza, streets and sectors that were to be preserved. It also included an area in barrio Playa, including the ruins of the old Fuerte de San José.It was not long before the creation of the Zone was opposed by local developers and the real estate service industry. Ismaro Torruella, president of the Municipal Assembly, who was originally one of the supporters of the creation of the Zone, succumbed to mounting pressure from local developers, business people and realtors and, by 1962, now favored the elimination, or at least the limitation, of the Zone. "The evidence on this matter is clear. Torruella and his colleagues wanted to make sure the public hearing was controlled by them." Opposing groups sought to make their voices known to the townspeople at large, not just to the Municipal Government and the ICP, and formed "Comite de Ciudadanos para el Progreso de Ponce". This committee included prominent businessmen such as Juan Eugenio Candal, Jose Maria Rovira, Gustavo Armstrong, Jose Moscoso, Tito Castro, among several others. To counter this group, supporters of the Historic Zone created their own "Comite Ponceño Pro Buen Progreso"." The debates went on for years with many public hearings taking place. Professional urban planning, traffic, and architectural studies, among others, also took place and recommendations were provided. One study categorized the architectural styles in the Historic Zone into seven groups: Neoclassical European, Spanish Colonial, Ponce Creole, Criollo Pueblerino, Criollo Residencial Pueblerino, Neoclassical Creole, and Neoclassical Superior.
On 17 November 2005, then-Governor of Puerto Rico, Aníbal Acevedo Vilá, signed Executive Order Number 72, approving the historic Ponce center as a Historic Center of First Order.

''Plan Ponce en Marcha''

In the 1990s an intensive $440 million revitalization project called "Plan Ponce en Marcha" has increased the city's historic area from 260 to 1,046 buildings. The Ponce en Marcha project was conceived in 1985 by then governor Rafael Hernández Colón during his second term in La Fortaleza. A significant number of buildings in Ponce are listed in the National Register of Historic Places. The nonprofit Project for Public Places listed the historic downtown Ponce city center as one of the 60 of the World's Great Places, for its "graciously preserved showcase of Caribbean culture". The Ponce en Marcha project has given even more form to the definition, establishment, and development of the Ponce Historic Zone. The plan is the result of litigation between the Government of the Autonomous Municipality of Ponce and the Government of Puerto Rico.
The Ponce en Marcha plan projects involve several departments of the Government of Puerto Rico:

Designation categories

Structures within the historic zone are classified into four categories:
  • The first consists of structures "with a monumental historic value", and part of the city's heritage.
  • The second is for those structures that while lacking a monumental historic value, possess some qualities of historic, architectural, or cultural interest.
  • The third category includes those structures of contextual value. These are those structures that may not intrinsically possess historic, architectural, or cultural value individually, but do enhance the area when they are considered contextually, as part of a larger group, as part of urban characteristic, or as part of the architecture of a section of a street.
  • And finally, category 4 is reserved for those structures that exist within the historic zone but whose value has not been assessed, that is, they are unclassified.

Sub-zones

The historic zone itself consists of three distinct sub-zones:
  • First Order Zone – This zone is limited to the area immediately surrounding Plaza Las Delicias. This is the original historic zone, created in 1962.
  • Second Order Zone – This is a zone that was added in 1989 further increasing the perimeter of the area around Plaza Las Delicias.
  • Third Order Zone – This zone was added in 1992, and it covered the communities of Mariani, Belgica, and parts of Clausells, and Cantera. It was also extended, for the first time, east of Rio Portugues, to cover the community of La Alhambra.
In August 2003, Mayor Cordero favored a measure to exclude Belgica, Claussells, and Cantera — all poor, low-income communities — from the historic zone.

Landmarks and attractions

Plazas and markets

Abolition Park, small plaza dedicated as a monument to the abolition of slavery in Puerto Rico that today hosts a small garden, an amphitheater, in addition to the monument itself.Dora Colón Clavell Square, Modernist plaza surrounded by various historic and architectural landmarks.Paseo Atocha, historic commercialized pedestrian street that connects Ponce's main town square with its main market square.Plaza del Mercado Isabel Segunda, the main market hall and market place of the city of Ponce. Famous for its Art Deco architecture, although no longer the main commercial building in the city it still functions as a marketplace and mall.Plaza Juan Ponce de León, Art Deco former meat market today functions as a pedestrian mall.Plaza Las Delicias, separated by the cathedral into Muñoz Rivera and Degetau Squares, is the main town square of the city of Ponce. Notable for its Victorian lampposts, fountains and landscaping, along with the Muñoz Rivera Park in San Juan, it is considered a trendsetter in the urban revitalization and redevelopment of public town squares in Puerto Rico during the 20th-century.Tricentenario Park, built to conmemorate the 300th anniversary of the founding of Ponce, consisting of three plazas dedicated to some of Ponce's most famous citizens.

Churches and religious buildings

Museums

Armstrong–Toro House, an ICP owned and managed house museum located at an architecturally significant residence designed by Manuel V. Domenech, considered one of the exemplary models of the Ponce Creole style.Carmen Solá de Pereira Ponce Cultural Center, cultural center and museum dedicated to the preservation of the culture and folklore of Ponce, located in the Ermelindo Salazar House.Francisco "Pancho" Coimbre Museum, dedicated to the history and documentation of sports in Puerto Rico, with a special focus on the life of baseball player Pancho Coimbre.Museum of Ponce Architecture, located in the Wiechers–Villaronga House, an ICP owned and manage architecture museum which interprets and showcases the wide range of architectural styles developed in the city of Ponce, in addition to the application of late 19th-century and early 20th-century local application of international architectural styles.Museum of Puerto Rican Autonomism, located in the grounds of the Old Cemetery of Ponce, it contains the Román Baldorioty de Castro National Pantheon, the burial place of many of Puerto Rico's most prominent historic figures.Museum of Puerto Rican Music, located in the historic Serrallés House, dedicated to the development and documentation of Puerto Rican music throughout its history.Paoli House, birthplace and house museum dedicated to the life and work of Antonio Paoli, the celebrated late 19th century and early 20th century Puerto Rican tenor.Parque de Bombas Museum, a former Victorian-style 1882 Exhibition Trade Fair pavilion today is one of the most iconic firehouses in Puerto Rico and a landmark of the city, hosting a firefighting museum that documents the history of the profession and of the building itself in the context of Ponce.Ponce History Museum, located in the Salazar–Candal House, dedicated to the social, cultural, political and natural history of Ponce.Ponce Massacre Museum, the ICP owned and managed museum documents and interprets the 1937 Ponce massacre.

Other places of interest