Valparaíso em movimento. Transportes públicos como oportunidade de regeneração urbana

Abstract

The following essay aims for the study of the public transportation's influence in the urban de- v velopment of the harbour city of Valparaíso, Chile, crossing its past with the future perspectives that it faces. Starting from a more general idea of urban regeneration of contemporary cities through the public transportation that includes, simultaneously, the large and small scale, the harbour city of Valparaíso stands as a case study with a special role in this duality for it represents, in many ways, an interesting deviation of the conventional Latin American city. Valparaíso was recently recognized as a World Heritage site and part of that recognition includes its urban transportation with special focus on its set of old funiculars. A historical analysis is presented seeking to recover some of the habits established in the late XIX century after the emergence of public transportation in Valparaíso through the study of the way it modified the city differently from the posterior arrival of the more recent individual motorized transportation. The common denominator to the study and subsequent intervention strategy is movement, key concept that shapes simultaneously the geography, the morphology and the ways of living in the city. Finally it is presented a project that defines a comprehensive strategy in large and small scale that, through an attempt of clarifying and adapting the public transportation in the city, would trigger a process of urban regeneration in the city.