Barcellona: città, porto e front de mar

Abstract

This essay focuses on the relationship between the city, its port and town planning schemes from 1860 to the present day. A study over a long time period brings to the fore a number of features unique to Barcelona. Some periods are of particular importance: the “City of Exchange” of the second half of the 15th century, when the first artificial port was constructed; the “City of Production” and its industrial port in plans by Ildefonso Cerdà and Léon Jaussely (19th and early 20th century); the “functional utopia” expressed by the Pla Macià in the 1930s; the “City of Process” of post-Franco Spain, (1980-86); and the “City of Great Events”, namely the Olympics in 1992 and the Forum in 2004.