Santa Fe () is the third locality of

Bogotá Bogotá (, also , , ), officially Bogotá, Distrito Capital, abbreviated Bogotá, D.C., and formerly known as Santa Fe de Bogotá (; ) during the Spanish period and between 1991 and 2000, is the capital city of Colombia, and one of the largest ...

, Capital District of Colombia. Santa Fe is part of the traditional

downtown ''Downtown'' is a term primarily used in North America by English speakers to refer to a city's sometimes commercial, cultural and often the historical, political and geographic heart. It is often synonymous with its central business distric ...

of the city of Bogotá, the area where the city was founded by

Gonzalo Jiménez de Quesada Gonzalo Jiménez de Quesada y Rivera, also spelled as Ximénez and De Quezada, (;1496 16 February 1579) was a Spanish explorer and conquistador in northern South America, territories currently known as Colombia. He explored the territory nam ...

on August 6, 1538. This area once comprised Bogotá's total main urban area and was known as "Santa Fe de Bogotá" with its traditional neighbourhoods. Santa Fe hosts some of the main business areas in Bogotá, and is served by the

Carrera Séptima Carrera Séptima (Seventh Street), also known as Eduardo Posada Flórez Avenue, is one of the principal transit arteries which crosses the eastern side of Bogotá north and south. It is the most important thoroughfare of the city in the sense o ...

, one of the main arteries of the city. The locality hosts most of Bogotá's skyscrapers. The International Center and the financial district along the

Avenida Jiménez Avenida Jiménez is a thoroughfare that runs through the locality of La Candelaria in Bogotá, Colombia. Laid out on the San Francisco River, the Environmental Axis of the city is currently established there. It extends over from Teleférico d ...

are also located within Santa Fe. The main streets of central Bogotá intersect in Santa Fe:

, formerly known as ''Calle Real'' (Royal Street), Carrera Décima, Calle 26,

Avenida Circunvalar Avenue or Avenues may refer to: Roads * Avenue (landscape), traditionally a straight path or road with a line of trees, in the shifted sense a tree line itself, or some of boulevards (also without trees) * Avenue Road, Bangalore * Avenue Road, Lon ...

, Avenida Caracas, Avenida Ciudad de Lima and Avenida Jiménez. Santa Fe also has a rural area located in the Eastern Hills of which

Monserrate Monserrate (named after Catalan homonym mountain '' Montserrat'') is a high mountain over 10,000 feet high that dominates the city center of Bogotá, the capital city of Colombia. It rises to above the sea level, where there is a church (built i ...

and

Guadalupe Guadalupe or Guadeloupe may refer to: Places Bolivia * Guadalupe, Potosí Brazil * Guadalupe, Piauí, a municipality in the state of Piauí * Guadalupe, Rio de Janeiro, a neighbourhood in the city of Rio de Janeiro Colombia * Guadalupe, A ...

are the main landmarks. The locality of La Candelaria was the location where Santa Fe de Bogotá was founded and is an enclave in the middle of the locality Santa Fe. La Candelaria was separated from Santa Fe after the creation of the Capital District.

History

Bogotá was founded by

on August 6, 1538, under the name of Santa Fe de Bogotá. The legal foundation occurred at the Bolívar Square in La Candelaria between the rivers of

San Francisco San Francisco (; Spanish language, Spanish for "Francis of Assisi, Saint Francis"), officially the City and County of San Francisco, is the commercial, financial, and cultural center of Northern California. The city proper is the List of Ca ...

(now Avenida Jiménez) and San Agustin (now Calle 6). During the early years of the 20th century, the city was confined within the present territory of Santa Fe, until the 1920s when urbanization expanded towards Chapinero and later towards the west. The westward expansion happened in the 1950s, just after the violent days of ''

El Bogotazo El Bogotazo (from "Bogotá" and the ''-azo'' suffix of violent augmentation) refers to the massive riots that followed the assassination in Bogotá, Colombia of Liberal leader and presidential candidate Jorge Eliécer Gaitán on 9 April 1948 ...

'' that partially destroyed the streets. Santa Fe got a minor city hall in 1972. With the Constitutional reform of 1991, Santa Fe legally became a locality (or a Local Action Junta) of the Capital District.

General data

Las Nieves calle 22 con kr 7 centro de bogotá

Santa Fe had a population of 107,044 people according to the 1993 census. Its average temperature is . It has a total area of and an urban area of . To the north, Santa Fe is bordered by the ''Canal Arzobispo'' or Calle 39, bordering the locality of Chapinero. To the south, it is bordered by Avenida Primera, with San Cristóbal. In the east, it is bordered by the Eastern Hils, bordering with the municipalities of Choachí and Ubaque in Cundinamarca. Lastly, the city is bordered in the west by the Avenida Caracas, with Teusaquillo, Los Mártires and Antonio Nariño. Among the neighbourhoods there are Las Cruces, Los Laches, La Perseverancia, La Concordia, Santa Inés, Santa Bárbara, San Bernardo, La Merced, Egipto, Germania, Las Aguas, La Paz, La Peña, Liévano, Las Nieves, El Consuelo, Belén, Egipto Alto, Central, El Rocío, Tisquesuza, La Macarena and El Bosque Izquierdo. Veredas are Monserrate and El Vergel. Santa Fe is crossed by the San Francisco River, San Agustín River,

Arzobispo River The Juan Amarillo, Arzobispo, or Salitre River is a river on the Bogotá savanna and a left tributary of the Bogotá River in Colombia. The river originates from various ''quebradas'' in the Eastern Hills and flows into the Bogotá River at th ...

and San Cristóbal River. Because of its proximity to the Eastern Hills, the urban area near these mountains is tilted some 40 degrees.

Economy

Santa Fe is mostly a commercial area with some small factories and service companies such as financial businesses, hotels and tourism facilities. There are some important universities in the area such as University of the Andes, Universidad Externado de Colombia, Jorge Tadeo Lozano University and others.

Transport

TransMilenio operates along the Avenida Caracas (lines A and H), Carrera Séptima (line M), Avenida Jiménez (line J) and a short segment of Calle 26 (line K). A

funicular A funicular (, , ) is a type of cable railway system that connects points along a railway track laid on a steep slope. The system is characterized by two counterbalanced carriages (also called cars or trains) permanently attached to opposite e ...

and an

aerial tramway An aerial tramway, sky tram, cable car, ropeway, aerial tram, telepherique, or seilbahn is a type of aerial lift which uses one or two stationary ropes for support while a third moving rope provides propulsion. With this form of lift, the grip ...

to climb

exist since 1926.

Sites of interest

BD Bacatá BD Bacatá (abbreviation for ''Bogotá Downtown Bacatá'') is an architectural complex currently under construction in Bogotá, Colombia, featuring the tallest building in the country, surpassing the Torre Colpatria, and the sixth tallest in S ...

* Colombian National Museum * Colpatria Tower * The Gold Museum * The

National Library of Colombia The National Library of Colombia ( es, Biblioteca Nacional de Colombia) is a national library located in Bogota, Colombia. The library is a dependency of the Colombian Ministry of Culture. Founding and history The National Library of Colombi ...

* The

Santamaría Bullring Santamaría Bullring (Spanish: ''Plaza de Toros de Santamaría'') is a bullring in Bogotá, Colombia, and it is currently used for bullfighting, although it has also been used for concerts and other cultural activities. The stadium holds 14,50 ...

* The churches of San Francisco, ''la Tercera'', ''la Veracruz'' and ''la Capuchina'' * Las Cruces Marketplace * Independence Park, Tercer Milenio Park and the Olaya Herrera National Park * The Natural History Museum * The Planetarium * La Rebeca * Avianca Tower

Notes and references

External links

*
Sitio de la Universidad Nacional sobre Santa Fe
* {{DEFAULTSORT:Santa Fe, Bogota Localities of Bogotá