Cidade Baixa (Porto Alegre)

General data

Population (2000): 16.634 inhabitants

Men: 6.957
Women: 9.677

Surface: 210 ha

Density: 79,21 hab/ha

Current limits

Avenue Praia de Belas to the street Barão de Gravataí; of this one with the avenue Getúlio Vargas and, by continuing this way in the Southern/Northern direction, to the avenue Venâncio Surfaces and with the avenue João Pessoa; of the latter to the avenue Perimetric to continue until the junction point of the avenue Borges de Medeiros with the avenue Praia de Belas.

Localization

The Cidade Baixa is one of the oldest districts exchange and of the city.

History

In the middle of the 19th century, " Cidade Baixa" was the denomination used to indicate all the zone located at the south of the hill of the street Duque de Caxias. The territory which is known as the district of Cidade Baixa had various names during its history: " Arraial da Baronesa" , " Emboscadas" , " Areal da Baronesa" and " Ilhota".

During the XIXe century, it was called " Arraial da Baronesa" and indicated large extension territorial which contained a property of Baronesa (baroness) of Gravataí, whose opulent residence was located where the Foundation Pão back Pobres is today, in the street of República ( to see low).

On this space were also semi-rural properties of which labor was made up of Esclave S. When those fled their Masters, they hid in the raised zones belonging to Arraial and who also sheltered of the outlaws, and who taken after the name of territory of the ambushes (" Emboscadas"). Into 1879, after a fire of its property, the baroness divided her grounds which were inhabited by free Blacks and Italian families. The territory took the name d'" Areal da Baronesa" , because of the red sand which was present in the place (the areal is a covered place of sand). Thus, until half of the 20th century, Cidade Baixa continued to be the refuge of the Italians, who lived artisanal tasks, and Blacks; the latter resided at Ilhota, the most unhealthy part where systematic floods occurred in the course of the years.

These zones belong to the history of Porto Alegre like spaces associated with the popular culture expressed through the Batucada S, the dances and the festivals organized by the black population. The carnival of Cidade Baixa was famous. This place left many musicians and type-setters, soloists and football players who were known in all the Brésil, such as Lupicínio Rodrigues and the football player Tesourinha.

The name d'" Ilhota" following an intervention carried out in 1905 on the course of Riachinho was allotted and which leads by the opening of a channel which brought the formation of an small island ( ilhota ) by accumulation of sediments. Later on, Riachinho was channeled and saw its course modified in 1941 by a municipal work of the administration of Jose Loureiro da Silva, becoming Arroio Dilúvio.

Starting from half of the XXe century, the population increased there significantly at the rate/rhythm of the disappearance of the last market-gardening grounds. The streets Avaí and Sarmento Leite started to receive factory constructions, and cinemas settled. Moreover, the sudden district of many urban installations insofar as its localization, with the urban extension, transformed it into point of passage towards other spaces of the city.

The foundation Pão back Pobres

An old institution of the district is the school complex and Orphelinat for poor children animated by the religious organization " O Pão back Pobres de Santo Antônio" (Bread of the poor of Holy Antoine), founded in 1895 by the canon bahiano Jose Marcelino de Souza Bittencourt. Today a foundation, the building where it is located was acquired in 1900 E inaugurated in 1910.

Today

Nowadays, the district is characterized by the great quantity of bars and is known to be the refuge of the Bohème S of the city, the essence of this animation being concentrated mainly in the streets General Lima E Silva, República and João Alfredo. Located close to the Park of Redenção, it is one of the greenest zones of the capital gaúcha. The proximity of the old campus of the federal Université of the Rio Grande C Sul (UFRGS) contributed to support in the district the concentration of academics, intellectuals and artists. Its population remains heterogeneous, which makes popular quarters of it, in the direction of a mixture of social classes. The descendants of slaves in escape still reside there on the site of old a Quilombo.

Bond external

Site of the Town hall of Porto Alegre

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