The Puente Río Portugués is a historic bridge over the former course of the
Río Portugués
Rio or Río is the Portuguese, Spanish, Italian, and Maltese word for "river". When spoken on its own, the word often means Rio de Janeiro, a major city in Brazil.
Rio or Río may also refer to:
Geography Brazil
* Rio de Janeiro
* Rio do Sul, a ...
in barrio
Playa
Playa (plural playas) may refer to:
Landforms
* Endorheic basin, also known as a sink, alkali flat or sabkha, a desert basin with no outlet which periodically fills with water to form a temporary lake
* Dry lake, often called a ''playa'' in the so ...
in the municipality of
Ponce,
Puerto Rico
Puerto Rico (; abbreviated PR; tnq, Boriken, ''Borinquen''), officially the Commonwealth of Puerto Rico ( es, link=yes, Estado Libre Asociado de Puerto Rico, lit=Free Associated State of Puerto Rico), is a Caribbean island and Unincorporated ...
. The bridge was added to the U.S.
National Register of Historic Places
The National Register of Historic Places (NRHP) is the United States federal government's official list of districts, sites, buildings, structures and objects deemed worthy of preservation for their historical significance or "great artistic v ...
in 2015.
[.] The bridge is prominent as "the oldest longitudinal steel beams / reinforced concrete bridge built within the historic
Carretera Central".
[.] It is located on
Avenida Hostos, just south of its intersection with
Ponce By Pass.
History
On 25 September 1852, the editor of Ponce newspaper ''
El Ponceño'' suggested a bridge be built where Puente Río Portugués is currently located. In 1856, the Ponce City Hall took on the matter and named a commission to detail the budget needed to build a bridge over Río Portugués. On 25 June 1857, the Puerto Rico Bidding Board opened up the bidding process and, having only one bid, it was given to
Juan Bertoli Calderoni
Juan Bertoli Calderoni (sometimes spelled ''Juan Bertoly Calderoni'') was a nineteenth-century French architect from Bastia, Corsica, and long-time resident of Ponce, Puerto Rico, where he designed various prominent structures including Tea ...
for his 12,400 pesos quote. The bridge would be known as ''Principe de Asturias Bridge'' or ''Principe Alfonso Bridge.'' The bridge opened in 1862. However, in 1864, there were floods that raze and destroyed it.
In 1876, the first non wooden bridge built at the site was brought from
France
France (), officially the French Republic ( ), is a country primarily located in Western Europe. It also comprises of Overseas France, overseas regions and territories in the Americas and the Atlantic Ocean, Atlantic, Pacific Ocean, Pac ...
, christened with the name
Alfonso XII, and installed that year. This metal bridged was used for 23 years until the river knocked it off as a result of the rising waters from
Hurricane San Ciriaco in 1899.
In 1903 a contract was awarded to Carlos Clausells for a wooden submersible bridge over Portugués River.
The French bridge was recovered 15 years later, in 1914, and installed near
Yauco, over Yauco's
Rio Duey, where it provided service until 1991,
''La carretera Central: Un Viaje Escénico a la Historia de Puerto Rico.''
Luis Pumarada O'Neill and Maria de los Angeles Castro Arroyo. Centro de Investigación y Desarrollo de la Universidad de Puerto Rico en Mayagüez. Prepared for: Oficina Estatal de Preservación Histórica de Puerto Rico. 1996. p.14. Accessed 8 February 2018. and today (2011) in can be seen at the Parque Urbano de Yauco, on highway PR-127 near the intersection with PR-128.[''De San Juan a Ponce por la Carretera Central.''](_blank)
Jose A. Mari Mut. Copyright 2011-2013. p. 132. Accessed 8 February 2018.
Thirty-four years after the hurricane, in 1933, the current bridge, ''Puente Rio Portugues'', was inaugurated. A steel plaque identifies the sitting governor and other officials at the time.
Architecture
The bridge is architecturally Art Deco
Art Deco, short for the French ''Arts Décoratifs'', and sometimes just called Deco, is a style of visual arts, architecture, and product design, that first appeared in France in the 1910s (just before World War I), and flourished in the Unite ...
style and structurally it is built as a longitudinal beam with the exterior made up of reinforced concrete, steel, and cast iron.
Gallery
Puente Rio Portugues 2 - Ponce Puerto Rico.jpg, View of the bridge looking south-southwest
The points of the compass are a set of horizontal, radially arrayed compass directions (or azimuths) used in navigation and cartography. A compass rose is primarily composed of four cardinal directions—north, east, south, and west—each se ...
towards Barrio Playa
Barrio Playa, also known as Playa de Ponce, Ponce Playa, or La Playa, is one of the thirty-one barrios that comprise the municipality of Ponce, Puerto Rico. Along with Bucaná, Canas, Vayas, and Capitanejo, Playa is one of the municipality's ...
Puente Rio Portugues lamppost 1 - Ponce Puerto Rico.jpg, Lamppost on Puente Río Portugués
See also
* Puente de los Leones
* Puente La Milagrosa
Puente La Milagrosa is a historic bridge in Ponce, Puerto Rico. The Art Deco bridge carries two lanes of vehicular traffic for the two-way Calle Guadalupe ( PR-14R). It runs west to east and crosses Río Portugués connecting Barrio Quinto in t ...
*
References
Further reading
* Abbad y Lasierra, Inigo. ''Historia geográfica, civil y natural de la Isla de San Juan Bautista de Puerto Rico.'' Anotada en la parte histórica y continuada en la estadistica y economica por Jose Julian Acosta y Calbo. Ediciones Doce Calles. 2002.
* Archivo General de Puerto Rico. Fondo: Obras Publicas. Serie: Carreteras y Puentes. Caja 2154, Legajo 53N; Caja 2155, Legajo 53"O"; Caja 2156, Legajo 53P; Caja 2157. Legajo 53Q (Construccion Puente Rio Portugues).
* Archivo General de Puerto Rico. Gobierno de Puerto Rico. Estadística general del comercio exterior o balancas mercantiles, 1895.
* Archivo General de Puerto Rico. Postales de la Colección Jungham.
* Franchises Granted by the extinct Executive Council and the Public Service Commission of Porto Rico. Franchise Ordinance No. 3. Volume 1I. 26 November 1901 to 21 May 1915. San Juan, Puerto Rico. Bureau of Supplies, Printing, and Transportation. 1924.
* Marin, Ramon. La Villa de Ponce considerada en tres distantas épocas: Estudio histórico, descriptivo y estadístico hasta finales del año 1876. Editoriales publicados en el periódico "La Crónica". Establecimiento Tipográfico "El Vapor". Ponce, Puerto Rico. 1877. See, Ramon Marín, Obras Completas. Ponce, Puerto Rico. 1989.
* Pumarada, O'Neill, Luis and Maria de los Angeles Castro. La Carretera Central. Un viaje escénico a la historia de Puerto Rico. Centro de Investigación y Desarrollo. Universidad de Puerto Rico, Reciento de Mayagüez. Oficina Estatal de Preservación Histórica. September 1977.
* Revista de Obras Públicas de Puerto Rico. Year XI. Number 6. June 1934.
* Tomás de Córdova, Pedro. Memorias geográficas, históricas y estadísticas de la isla de Puerto Rico. Tomo II. Year: 1831. Instituto de Cultura Puertorriqueña. San Juan, Puerto Rico. 1968.
* Ubeda y Delgado, Manuel. Isla de Puerto Rico: Estudio histórico, geográfico y estadístico de la misma. Puerto Rico. Establecimiento Tip. Del Boletin. 1878.
External links
Summary sheet
from the Puerto Rico State Historic Preservation Office
* , National Register of Historic Places cover documentation
{{DEFAULTSORT:Puente Rio Portugues
Road bridges on the National Register of Historic Places in Puerto Rico
Bridges completed in 1933
National Register of Historic Places in Ponce, Puerto Rico
Bridges in Ponce, Puerto Rico
1933 establishments in Puerto Rico
Art Deco architecture in Puerto Rico
Concrete bridges