Iglesia de San Pedro ad vincula (Vallecas - Madrid)

Vallecas was a municipality of Spain that disappeared as such in 1950, when its annexation to the Municipality of

Madrid Madrid ( , ) is the capital and most populous city of Spain. The city has almost 3.4 million inhabitants and a metropolitan area population of approximately 6.7 million. It is the second-largest city in the European Union (EU), and ...

was effectuated. Nowadays it is a large neighborhood of Madrid composed of two districts: Puente de Vallecas (population 240,917) and Villa de Vallecas (population 65,162).

Overview

Vallecas is known for its

working-class The working class (or labouring class) comprises those engaged in manual-labour occupations or industrial work, who are remunerated via waged or salaried contracts. Working-class occupations (see also " Designation of workers by collar colou ...

inhabitants who have given it the local names Vallekas or Valle del Kas. Many initiatives that take place in the district show this countercultural attitude by replacing the letter ''c'' with ''k'', examples of this are the local radio station Radio Vallekas, the local television channel Tele K, the music festival Vallekas Rock, etc. The local pride coalesces around the

Rayo Vallecano Rayo Vallecano de Madrid, S.A.D. (), often abbreviated to Rayo (Spanish for "thunderbolt"), is a Spanish professional football club based in Madrid, in the neighbourhood of Vallecas. Rayo was founded on 29 May 1924, and currently compete in La Lig ...

football team. During the 1960s, many Spanish immigrants to the Madrid conurbation settled in Vallecas, forming the largest slum area around Madrid. During the decades of the

Francoist State Francoist Spain ( es, España franquista), or the Francoist dictatorship (), was the period of Spanish history between 1939 and 1975, when Francisco Franco ruled Spain after the Spanish Civil War with the title . After his death in 1975, Spai ...

, Vallecas earned its reputation as a neighbourhood of resistance against the Francoist State. In this tradition, Vallecas is also home to the Spanish

ska Ska (; ) is a music genre that originated in Jamaica in the late 1950s and was the precursor to rocksteady and reggae. It combined elements of Caribbean mento and calypso with American jazz and rhythm and blues. Ska is characterized by a walki ...

band

Ska-P Ska-P () is a Spanish ska punk band formed in 1994 in Vallecas, a district of Madrid, by a group of friends from Madrid, Navarre and Euskadi. Review by Chris Trueat Allmusic The band can be categorized, politically, as an anti-establishment mu ...

, noted for its anarchist and leftist lyrics. In recent years, the district of Vallecas Villa has experienced significant growth with about 25,000 new flats and houses called "PAU de Vallecas" or "Ensanche de Vallecas", one of the biggest new areas in Madrid. Professional footballer

Álvaro Negredo Álvaro Negredo Sánchez (; born 20 August 1985) is a Spanish professional Association football, footballer who plays for Cádiz CF, Cádiz as a Striker (association football), striker. Nicknamed ''La fiera de Vallecas'' (The beast of Vallecas ...

is Vallecas' most famous export. Nicknamed ''The Beast of Vallecas'', Negredo currently plays for

Cádiz CF Cádiz Club de Fútbol, S.A.D., known simply as Cádiz, is a Spanish professional football club based in Cádiz, Andalusia. Founded in 1910, the club competes in the La Liga, holding home games at Nuevo Mirandilla, with a seating capacity of 20 ...

. The famous lightweight boxer

Poli Díaz Policarpo "Poli" Díaz Arevalo (born November 21, 1967) is a Spanish former professional boxer who competed from 1986 to 2001. He held the European lightweight title from 1988 to 1991, and challenged for the unified WBA, WBC and IBF lightwe ...

, nicknamed ''The Colt of Vallecas'', also comes from this renowned working-class neighbourhood.

Atlético Madrid Club Atlético de Madrid, Sociedad Anónima Deportiva, S.A.D. (; meaning "Athletic Club of Madrid"), known simply as Atleti in the Spanish-speaking world and commonly referred to at international level as Atlético Madrid, is a Spanish profess ...

and Spain national team midfielder Koke was also born in Vallecas.

References

External links

Vallecas Todo Cultura

paudevallecas.org
(website of a neighborhood-organisation in the new housing area in the district of Vallecas Villa, with web-forum, in Spanish) Neighbourhoods of Madrid Former municipalities in Spain {{madrid-geo-stub

Overview

See also

References

External links