The City and the River

PORTO • THE CITY AND THE RIVER

One of the main characteristics of the city, apart from the Douro river, is the bridges that keep being built over the last 150 years. Bridges link, they have this simbolycal meaning of bringing together the two sides of the river.

The Douro river margins were connected for centuries by small boats as in the picture, tied together to allow passage between the 200 meter width at is narrowest point.Since the first steel bridge was built, others kept being added, and are now part of the view.
They connect the cities of Porto and Gaia, or Portus and Calle as the romans called them, hence Portuscale.

Time, accumulated time, does confer to a city and its characteristics a dignity that has earned Porto the right to be recognized UNESCO World Heritage.
Like Lisbon who is bathed by the Tagus river, the Douro river played an important part in Porto's economy as the exporting place for Port Wine.
However the city does not live because of the river, but it worships it in its own way, by enjoying it.

It is time that witnesses the changing moods of the river and its bridges. The flow of the river is a permanent metaphor of the flow of life, of its beginning and its end at the Atlantic ocean.

It is an aerial view such as this one that can add comprehension to the Douro meeting the Atlantic and the two cities.
The bridges are hidden by the river mild sinuosity.
Then click here for the city map.
The FOZ or river mouth is to the left of the picture considered the best living zone.
To the right is Gaia, where all the Port Wine is stored and where the cellars are located.

	One way to reach the riverside also known as Ribeira, is to cross the city and reach the Ferreira Borges Square, where a red steel construction built as a food market in the 19th. century has been reconverted into a multi-use area where exhibitions and conferences take place. This area main characteristic is stone. Granite facades in churches or the Palacio da Bolsa (the Stock Exchange Palace) blend with many glazed tile facades which are typical of Portugal. Granite prevails in the pavement and continues into the riverside. Porto inhabitants in general show the cultural heritage in their character. They have a very strong sense of identity, are indomitable when they exercise their will, yet as pleasant, kind and helpful to offer the visitor a view of the city through their own windows, because for them, their window has the best view. It was this strong sense of identity and will that in the past prevented the city of being taken by Napoleonic armies and just in 2003 and 2004 FCPorto soccer team win the UEFA Cup and the Champions League Cup respectively. Known as the city of labour, Portugal's wealth lies here in high percentage.

These pictures were taken as the sun went down adding a touch of gold at the Ferreira Borges Square.

Taking an old street going down, one can see the river instantly, while passing the house of Henry the Navigator and his motto *Talent de bien faire. As the short descent reaches flat ground, a small square shows well restored ancient boatmen houses and looking at the horizon one is faced with Gaia* across the river, gold plated by the late sun, a convent toppling the hill. To the left, in shadow, some umbrellas indicate one of the many restaurants.

Who knows, perhaps the Douro was the fluvial experience that launched Portugal into the Discoveries. It had the Ocean to one side and Spain to the other.
What is now called the Ribeira, had been the training place for many sailors. Nowadays it is a very sought after tourist spot as well as intensely frequented by the Portuenses (people from Porto).
The interesting thing is that from the granite, suddenly the visitor is confronted with an outburst of color in many ranges, be it the night lighting, the house facades, the boats, the walls. It is a symphony composed on top of the granite, as if its musicality would balance the stones lyrics

INTIMACIES

Every city has its secrets, intimate places, dwellings that are the very own realm of their inhabitants. But the river invites the ancient to open itself to the flowing waters.
This opening is a dialogue between the architecture and the river and I was lucky enough to profit from it.

FOZ means river mouth. When one follows the Douro to its mouth on Porto's side of the river, one is led into a long area of rocks facing the water, or beaches where the ocean is kinder. The earlier half near the mouth is called Foz Velha, meaning old part of the river mouth, but Foz acquired the same meaning as the word Manhattan in New York, Picadilly in London, or Ginza in Tokyo. It is no more a fluvial designation but more of an area connected with wealth. Past wealth is in the protected area of Foz Velha (old foz).

Cars have inevitably invaded the old area of the Foz and in the large picture one can see a 19th.century house turned into a bank, while the next picture shows a window with a sculpture inside. It is an antiquarian, and the yellow house is a decoration shop. Glazed tiles are also part of the old bourgeois area where a side street apparently modest house can be a very exclusive luxurious restaurant.

Walking further upwards one keeps discovering...

a small triangular square with a garden. It is all very intimate and the details are refined.

I chose three houses with a predominant blue to match the sky. Glazed tiles combine with granite framed doors and windows. Silent faces, or facades, staring at each other in a silent dialogue.

The area where I live was once woods. In the 60's the city begun to expand and new architecture was born in a way to rationalize space. Low four to five storey condominiums of pleasant appearance begun to make their appearance, while architects such as Siza Vieira begun to obtain world recognition and international awards. In my opinion the strong identity and heavy cultural concerns of a great deal of the people played a big role hand in hand with the richness of the city.
Independent houses coexist with condominiums and a superb urbanism can be felt. Green is a concern with the Porto people.




Though with variations, in some cases one is able to track the archetypes from some of the Ribeira houses, while in others still under construction, daring approaches are being built. It is interesting to note that even the silent upper-ground train runs in tracks merged with lawn as well as the interplay of blocks and space

The Egas Moniz Hospital is a five year old addition to the area.

The private University where my son studies is frequented by students even in vacation time to work on the many new Macintosh computers available. Different exhibitions by students are held during the entire year.

THE CITY AND THE FARM

Being an ancient city, rural areas surrounded Porto until the seventies, when urban expansion became pressing and the small farms and rural land begun to change. However, back in 1932 Ezequiel de Campos already suggested the construction of leisure area. One of the main areas that deserve the best of my enthusiasm is what is called the City Park, a large area of 45 hectars which can be seen in the map as Parque da Cidade.
There is a permanent dialogue between life components such as rurality and urbanism and this interaction provides extraordinary virtues of pleasure and leisure.

One of the main entrances to the City Park is done by the Rua da Vilarinha, an ancient street in cobblestone where my wife's ancestral house is. It can be clearly seen in the map just above the Parque da Cidade sign. The houses are all traditional and date back to either early or mid 19th. century.
Most had a garden inside, still visible behind high walls and abundant foliage.

The entrance to the built part of the City Park and my promenade inside is shown in a natural sequence of pictures from left to right and top to bottom. They should speak for themselves, as they are recovered agricultural houses transformed in leisure places.

There is a conglomerate of old rustic houses that were main and assisting buildings of small farms. These have all been subject to a reconversion programme, becoming deluxe restaurants, horse riding schools, places of leisure, all in a strong compromise between the past and the present.

Here and elsewhere, we are confronted with acts of culture such as adapting the entire place into what it is now as well as the old secondary house into a bar, within short walking distance from the restaurant.
Now that the notion of culture has been put into use in a practical way, I find it more and palpable than the mere elitist definition of culture which is, in my view, too distant from human activity today.

There would be plenty of angles, of walks to show, but photographs are an appeal to the viewer's intelligence in doing his own interpretation of the place.

There is a gentleness in nature when it blends with stone transformed by the hand of men. The Park now spreads through acres of generous earth, while the cars and the city surround it. It is a kind of paradise inside the city, as many cities have, each in its own unique way.

	The Avenida da Boavista is one of the longest avenues, 4 km long that links the Boavista Roundabout to the Foz. It was crossed by a horse pulled tram, then it had a train and it is now crossed by cars and buses. Most of its early houses were 19th. century mansions owned by rich bourgeois families which slowly gave way into other more modern houses.



As time changed, blocks were bought by banks which had however some care of building interesting contemporary architecture not too high so as to offend the overall length of the Boavista Avenue.