Villa Alemana ("German Village" in English) is a

city A city is a human settlement of notable size.Goodall, B. (1987) ''The Penguin Dictionary of Human Geography''. London: Penguin.Kuper, A. and Kuper, J., eds (1996) ''The Social Science Encyclopedia''. 2nd edition. London: Routledge. It can be def ...

and

commune A commune is an alternative term for an intentional community. Commune or comună or comune or other derivations may also refer to: Administrative-territorial entities * Commune (administrative division), a municipality or township ** Communes of ...

Chile Chile, officially the Republic of Chile, is a country in the western part of South America. It is the southernmost country in the world, and the closest to Antarctica, occupying a long and narrow strip of land between the Andes to the east a ...

's Zona Central. It was founded in 1896 by Italian and German immigrants. Villa Alemana is a part of the urban area known as

Greater Valparaiso Greater may refer to: *Greatness, the state of being great *Greater than, in inequality * ''Greater'' (film), a 2016 American film *Greater (flamingo), the oldest flamingo on record * "Greater" (song), by MercyMe, 2014 *Greater Bank, an Australian ...

. Villa Alemana's flag is notable for having the

flag of the German Empire The Flag of the German Empire, or Imperial Flag, Realm Flag, (German: ''Reichsflagge)'' is a combination between the flag of Prussia and the flag of the Hanseatic League. The flag was first used as the flag of the North German Confederation whic ...

banded on it, along with the

Flag of Germany The national flag of Germany is a tricolour (flag), tricolour consisting of three equal horizontal bands displaying the national colours of Germany: Sable (heraldry), black, Gules, red, and Or (heraldry), gold (german: :de:Schwarz-Rot-Gold, Sc ...

History

Villa Alemana was founded at the beginning of a Chilean railway development. Its climate is so temperate that the slogan is "The City of Eternal Youth" ("La ciudad de la eterna juventud" in Spanish) or "City of the Mills" ("Ciudad de los Molinos" in Spanish). There was originally nothing but fields as well as a small vineyard, trees and flowers, dominated by hawthorn trees (''

Crataegus ''Crataegus'' (), commonly called hawthorn, quickthorn, thornapple, Voss, E. G. 1985. ''Michigan Flora: A guide to the identification and occurrence of the native and naturalized seed-plants of the state. Part II: Dicots (Saururaceae–Cornacea ...

''). Where the Theater Pompeya stands today, land was offered for 20 cents per meter. And that was where Don Buenaventura Joglar had the idea to buy land and build a population which he named Villa Alemana, as German emigrants were the first to buy these sites. On 8 November 1894, it was founded under the name of Viña Miraflores. The property was owned by Don Buenaventura Joglar, who divided the land into lots and set the name of Villa Alemana. On 5 January 1918, the commune of Villa Alemana was established, but in 1928 it was incorporated in

Quilpué Quilpué is a city and capital of the Marga Marga Province in central Chile's Valparaíso Region. It is part of the Greater Valparaíso metropolitan area. It is widely known as "City of the Sun" (''Ciudad del Sol'') and the urban part of it also ...

. On 7 June 1933, Villa Alemana separated from Quilpué, recreating the commune of Villa Alemana. Today, it is a

bedroom community A commuter town is a populated area that is primarily residential rather than commercial or industrial. Routine travel from home to work and back is called commuting, which is where the term comes from. A commuter town may be called by many o ...

for

Viña del Mar Viña del Mar (; meaning "Vineyard of the Sea") is a city and commune on central Chile's Pacific coast. Often referred to as ("The Garden City"), Viña del Mar is located within the Valparaíso Region, and it is Chile's fourth largest city w ...

and

Valparaíso Valparaíso (; ) is a major city, seaport, naval base, and educational centre in the commune of Valparaíso, Chile. "Greater Valparaíso" is the second largest metropolitan area in the country. Valparaíso is located about northwest of Santiago ...

Demographics

According to the 2002

census A census is the procedure of systematically acquiring, recording and calculating information about the members of a given population. This term is used mostly in connection with national population and housing censuses; other common censuses incl ...

of the

National Statistics Institute National Institute of Statistics may refer to: *National Institute of Statistics of Bolivia *National Institute of Statistics of Cambodia *National Institute of Statistics and Census of Costa Rica *National Institute of Statistics and Census of Nica ...

, Villa Alemana spans an area of and has 95,623 inhabitants (45,868 men and 49,755 women). Of these, 94,802 (99.1%) lived in

urban area An urban area, built-up area or urban agglomeration is a human settlement with a high population density and infrastructure of built environment. Urban areas are created through urbanization and are categorized by urban morphology as cities, t ...

s and 821 (0.9%) in

rural area In general, a rural area or a countryside is a geographic area that is located outside towns and cities. Typical rural areas have a low population density and small settlements. Agricultural areas and areas with forestry typically are descri ...

s. The population grew by 33.4% (23,951 persons) between the 1992 and 2002 censuses.

Administration

As a commune, Villa Alemana is a third-level

administrative division of Chile The administrative division or territorial organization of Chile exemplifies characteristics of a unitary state. State administration is functionally and geographically decentralized, as appropriate for each authority in accordance with the law. ...

administered by a

municipal council A municipal council is the legislative body of a municipality or local government area. Depending on the location and classification of the municipality it may be known as a city council, town council, town board, community council, rural counci ...

, headed by an

alcalde Alcalde (; ) is the traditional Spanish municipal magistrate, who had both judicial and administrative functions. An ''alcalde'' was, in the absence of a corregidor, the presiding officer of the Castilian '' cabildo'' (the municipal council) a ...

who is directly elected every four years. The 2021-2024 alcalde is Javiera Toledo Muñoz. The council has the following members: * Edith Alvear Guerra * Cecilia Quinteros Díaz * Marcelo Valderrama Magna * Guillermo Barra Arancibia * Kesia Navarro Cueto * Marcelo Góngora Carvajal * María Fernanda Ternicier Andrades * Alonso Fierro Reguera Within the

electoral divisions of Chile Chile has two distinct electoral division systems: * To elect members of the Chamber of Deputies and of the Senate, Chile is divided into several electoral divisions, namely electoral districts and senatorial constituencies. * To elect members of ...

Villa Alemana is part of the 6th electoral district, represented in the

Chamber of Deputies The chamber of deputies is the lower house in many bicameral legislatures and the sole house in some unicameral legislatures. Description Historically, French Chamber of Deputies was the lower house of the French Parliament during the Bourbon R ...

by the deputies: * Andrés Longton Herrera ( RN) * Luis Pardo Sainz ( RN) * Camila Flores Oporto ( RN) * Pablo Kast Sommerhoff ( EVOPOLI) * Marcelo Schilling Rodríguez ( PS) * Carolina Marzán Pinto ( PPD) * Daniel Verdessi Belemmi ( DC) * Diego Ibáñez Cotroneo ( CS) As part of the 6th senatorial constituency (

), the commune is represented in the

Senate A senate is a deliberative assembly, often the upper house or chamber of a bicameral legislature. The name comes from the ancient Roman Senate (Latin: ''Senatus''), so-called as an assembly of the senior (Latin: ''senex'' meaning "the el ...

by the senators: * Francisco Chahuán Chahuán ( RN) * Kenneth Pugh Olavarría ( RN) * Ricardo Lagos Weber ( PPD) * Isabel Allende Bussi ( PS) * Juan Ignacio Latorre Rivero ( RD)

Twin cities

Bethlehem Bethlehem (; ar, بيت لحم ; he, בֵּית לֶחֶם '' '') is a city in the central West Bank, Palestine, about south of Jerusalem. Its population is approximately 25,000,Amara, 1999p. 18.Brynen, 2000p. 202. and it is the capital o ...

State of Palestine Palestine ( ar, فلسطين, Filasṭīn), Legal status of the State of Palestine, officially the State of Palestine ( ar, دولة فلسطين, Dawlat Filasṭīn, label=none), is a state (polity), state located in Western Asia. Officiall ...

References

External links

*
Municipality of Villa Alemana
{{Authority control Populated places in Marga Marga Province Communes of Chile Populated places established in 1894