In 1975, Honduras was under a military regime that had been in power for over a decade, led at the time by General Juan Alberto Melgar Castro. During this period, Tegucigalpa underwent several big and unprecedented changes. The influx of people from various parts of the country due to rural migration transformed the city from a compact urban area into an expanding metropolis. This unexpected growth prompted the government to implement a municipal development and planning scheme, a project that would define the city’s future and the evolution of its old town. This article was developed with the collaboration of the Honduran architect Lisandro Calderón, who specializes in Urban Planning and is currently a professor at the Central American Technological University (UNITEC), located in Tegucigalpa, Honduras.
The Creation of the Metroplan
In the 1930s, Tegucigalpa merged with the neighboring city of Comayagüela (Tegucigalpa D.C.). By the 70s, Tegucigalpa was not a municipality but rather a district controlled by the central government. Calderón explains that during that time, the figure of city government was performed by a metropolitan council known as “Consejo Metropolitano del Distrito Central” which had a president who acted as mayor. It was under this political entity that the city’s development scheme, the Mertroplan, was originally proposed, as a response to a massive rural migration of people that peaked during the 1960s.
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According to Daniela Navarrete in her book on the subject from 2020, the idea of the plan is conceived with financing from the Interamerican Development Bank. The government then names the Honduran architect Henry Merriam Weddle as director and gives him the task of putting together a team. During that time, Honduras didn’t have an architecture school yet, and most of the local architects like himself had been educated abroad, in architecture schools from Mexico, Brazil, and Argentina. This is what probably prompted Merriam to collaborate with two Argentine architects: Edgardo Roberto Derbes and Osvaldo Roberto Ramacciotti, both holding a master’s degree in urbanism from MIT and Yale in the United States respectively. Ramacciotti had already been working in Central America years prior, elaborating a similar plan for the capital of Guatemala in 1971. Before that, he had also been the Urban Planning Director in the City of Cordoba in Argentina, where he had participated in the design of the first pedestrian promenade in the city in 1969.
The Influence of Metroplan
In 1975, this team implemented a metropolitan planning project. This, according to Calderón, took the form of a publication composed of 6 books detailing each part of the plan, that later became known simply as the “Metroplan”. The scheme presented a vision for the city extending to the year 2000 with an initial phase covering up to 1980. Its concept focused on decentralizing functions from the old town, which at that time was functioning as a multipurpose urban center.
The city’s biggest stores were located in the old town. All the government’s functions were there too: The Presidential House, Congress, the Central Bank, all of the Ministries and other institutions were there and in its adjacent areas. It was even a transportation hub. All the intercity buses arrived at the Morazan Plaza and there, people would change to other parts of the city– Lisandro Calderón
Given the educational background of Merriam’s team, it is no surprise that the plan was conceived under the influence of urban theories from the United States and Europe, as Navarrete explains in her 2018 article. This can be corroborated through a textbook written by Ramacciotti for the University of Cordoba in 1980. Under those influences, the team looked at the city from a national, regional, and local perspective. They identified possible industrial hubs in the city’s neighboring areas such as the Amarateca Valley. They also designated tourist-agricultural centers in towns next to Tegucigalpa such as Ojojona, Santa Lucía and Valle de Ángeles, and identified other service centers such as the Zamorano Valley.
Within the metropolitan area, they prioritized highways as primary determinants of city design and designated specific zoning regulations. The old town would now be an area exclusively for commerce, relocating governmental functions to a new Civic Center situated on a hill on the south of the city, between Miraflores and El Pedregal, along the Fuerzas Armadas Boulevard. Additionally, markets such as “El Jacaleapa” and “El Manchén” were built to relieve the old town from the intense commercial activity. The old Spanish Plaza Morazan was remodeled and extended. In an interview with architect Merriam in 2018, he also added that along with the expansion, a pedestrian street was created to promote commerce and the exploration of the old town’s historic monuments. There was also a proposal to relocate Toncontin Airport to an area near “La Laguna” in the northwest of the city, although this plan was never realized.
At the same time, according to Ricardo Caceres in his article from 2018, the National Housing Institute (INVA) contributed to all these changes. Founded in 1957, it developed residential neighborhoods with social housing such as “La Kennedy” and “La 21 de Octubre”. However, after Metroplan was implemented, neighborhoods such as “San Jose del Pedregal” were some of the first to follow the regulations proposed in the scheme. The creation of all these new settlements further promoted the creation of multiple urban centers. These new residential areas were originally far from the old town and were later connected by highways to provide access to modern services. These boulevards created empty land along their edges which later contributed to the construction of more convenient shopping centers that gradually replaced the old town.
The Transformation of Tegucigalpa’s Old Town
In that regard, it was the area of the old town that was most affected by all the urban restructuring. Since Spanish times up to the early 1970s, the area displayed civic monumentality with three-story buildings, ornate facades, and an architectural profile that gave the city an identifiable character. The old Spanish Plaza was the heart of it all, with the Cathedral and its dome as its focal point, surrounded by buildings that fostered neoclassical facades. Iconic cafés like “El Jardín de Italia” or “Café de Paris” encouraged community engagement, while neighboring streets were hubs of economic and social activity. However, after 1975 this character started to change as the old town became just one of the centers, the historic one.
Back then, there was no heritage legislation, but the buildings were well kept, no matter how old, because they were in constant use. But with the appearance of several shopping centers along the newly created boulevards, many stores start to migrate, dislocating the commercial activity in the area. But what starts the process of decline is moving the Presidential House to the new Civic Center. It created a big exodus of government functions which significantly reduced the flow of people to the old town. – Lisandro Calderón
In fact, it is possible to start looking at the transformation of the Historic Center linking it to the lack of legislation to protect urban heritage. While the concept of a “historic monument” existed, it was limited to Spanish churches and governmental buildings from the 1800s, excluding private properties and other architecturally valuable structures. That was enhanced by the lack of architectural awareness in the country. Honduras just started having an architecture school in UNAH until 1981, and the country’s first regulation regarding heritage preservation, didn’t officially appear until 1984.
The absence of awareness led to the demolition of classic buildings, which were replaced by modern constructions that in most cases disregarded the scale and aesthetics of their surroundings. The Architecture Guide of Honduras published by CAH in 2013, mentions one of the earliest examples is from the 60s. A building known as “Los Corredores” which hosted the “Café de París”, was Replaced by the Midence Soto Building, a 9-story modernist tower that blocked the view of the Spanish cathedral’s dome as the main architectural reference in the area.
Other prominent examples happened after 1975. Promoters, taking advantage of economic activity happening in the old town, took down the former “La Samaritana” store and the “Bank of Honduras” Building, replacing them with a tower complex, illustrating this loss of architectural identity. The phenomenon was not unique to Honduras though. Cities like Montreal in Canada also faced similar issues in the 1970s, when urban renewal prioritized modernism and brutalism over historical preservation. For Montreal, figures such as Phyllis Lambert played an important role in saving this heritage, but Tegucigalpa had no such figure advocating for the protection of its monuments.
Parallel to that, the relocation of the central government created less movement of people. According to Arely Rivera in her article from 2018, it forced commercial activity in the area to gradually relocate to the new shopping malls. Some authors such as Leticia Salomon and Betania Galo in a city analysis from 1988, argue this was a great contributor to the beginning of the area’s decline. They say that by 1974, the old town including both Tegucigalpa and Comayagüela only held 10% of the total housing in the city, suggesting that the Metroplan’s classification of the area as reserved for residential and commercial use was not able to keep it active. This decline worsened in the 1990s due to the appearance of informal commerce, paired with hindered pedestrian traffic and rising levels of insecurity.
However some government functions remained in the area, such as the Congress, a modernist building designed by Mario Valenzuela, which itself replaced an old wooden house in the same location. Some of the historic buildings have also been restored. These include the Cathedral and the Museum for National Identity. With the appearance of architecture guides, books and content on social media, there is also more conscience today about the area’s value. However, commercial activity like during the 1970s has not yet returned.
Today, Tegucigalpa’s Historic Center is a living testament to the city’s transformations. While it has lost part of its architectural legacy, it still retains buildings that help tell the history of Honduras. These spaces invite reflection on how contemporary life in Tegucigalpa came to be and on the importance of preserving cultural and architectural heritage. It gives testimony of the effects that modernist ideas had in the city, and ultimately serves not just as a reminder of the past but as a guide to building a future with greater awareness and respect for the city’s identity.
References:
- O. Ramacciotti (1980), “194 notas sobre urbanismo, planeamiento y diseño urbano”, Tome II, Argentina: Universidad Nacional de Córdoba, Facultad de Arquitectura y Urbanismo.
- D. Navarrete Calix (2018) “De Metroplan a la (de) Construcción Postmoderna de Tegucigalpa 1972-1944”, Revista Arte y Cultura , Volume 9, Number 2, pp-8-27, Honduras: Centro de Arte y Cultura UNAH, ISSN 2520-9779.
- D. Navarrete Calix (2020), “Tegucigalpa: Laboratorio Urbano de las Modernidades Hondureñas, siglos XIX y XX”, pp.365-374, Spain: Editorial Académica Española, ISBN 978-620-0-42057-2
- UNAH (2018), “Entrevista al Arquitecto Henry Merriam”, Revista Arte y Cultura , Volume 9, Number 2, pp-28-33, Honduras: Centro de Arte y Cultura UNAH, 2018 ,ISSN 2520-9779.
- A. Rivera Dala (2018), “Arquitectura Urbana de Uso Público Comercial en Tegucigalpa: Pasajes Comerciales, Calle Peatonal y Centros Comerciales”, Revista Arte y Cultura , Vol. 9, No 2, pp 34-47, Honduras: Centro de Arte y Cultura UNAH, ISSN 2520-9779.
- R. Cáceres (2018), “El Desarrollo Urbano del Distrito Central: Situación Socio-espacial y Funcional de la Ciudad”, Revista Arte y Cultura , Volume 9, Number 2, pp74-89, Honduras: Centro de Arte y Cultura UNAH, ISSN 2520-9779.
- L. Salomón and B. Galo (1988), “Expansión y Estructuración Urbana de Tegucigalpa” in “La Estructuración de las Ciudades Capitales Centroamericanas”, edited by R. F. Vásquez and M. Lungo Uclés, First Edition, pp. 289–318, Costa Rica: Editorial EDUCA,ISBN:9977301174.
- AECID-CAH (2013), “Honduras: An Architectural and Landscape Guide”, pp. 141-273, Spain: Junta de Andalucía, ISBN: 978-84-87001-26-0.
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