Abstract
Spanish Islamic cities stagnated or declined after 1492. Because of the expulsion of Jews and Moors, despite the repopulation policies, they seemed to “petrify” their size. The uninhabited houses and the suburbs disappeared. The extension and population of the main Muslim cities, Almeria, Seville, Toledo, Valencia, Zaragoza, tended to decrease. Murcia and Granada are two paradigmatic cases of evolution. In the kingdom of Granada, Baza was an important settlement at the end of Middle Ages. Urban transformations adapted it to Castilian policies: mosques were transformed into churches, squares and gates were opened, some streets widened, and so on. However, its size remained “petrified.” In the nineteenth century, there was a strong population growth cushioned by the phenomenon of “cave-house.” From mid-twentieth century, it had a strong expansion and growth regardless urban plans. Currently, the city, declared as Historic Site, has slowed down its growth, although its planning foresees it will keep growing.
Introduction and Methodology
The transit of the refined civilization of the Roman Empire, with its many large and perfectly urbanized monumental cities, to the primitive and rural life of the first medieval centuries, is a historical phenomenon that offers a dramatic interest. At the bottom of all alert awareness, the suspicion makes its home in the fact that it can be repeated with characteristics of greater universality; today’s large cities of huge size could quickly become tomorrow’s immense fields of ruins, piously wrapped in a blanket of spontaneous vegetation.
1
A similar phenomenon, although of lesser magnitude, occurred in many cities and towns of the Iberian Peninsula (Figure 1) after the expulsion of Jews and Moors. Despite the strong economic and social development that should have occurred with the discovery of America, many cities seemed to got “petrified” in size. The uninhabited houses and the suburbs sometimes disappeared. Knowing its dimension implies analyzing the population that lived there over time.
Medieval kingdoms in the Iberian Peninsula 1360 B.C. (Ed. By Bury Longman Green and Co.3rd ed.).
In Europe, the medieval city, as a type, was established during the High Middle Ages (1000-1300) and its economic character and distribution throughout Europe remained basically unchanged in the early modern times and until the Industrial Revolution. 2
The reality of the Hispanic Muslim cities was different. Córdoba during the tenth century, in the splendor of the Caliphate, reached an exceptional urban development, which can be compared in the east with the city of Constantinople, the most populated in the Middle East, in the tenth and eleventh centuries. Before the second millennium, the only cities were Rome and perhaps Constantinople, Cordoba and Baghdad. 3 Constantinople would have an estimated population close to one million inhabitants. Others estimate it between 250,000 and 350,000, 4 an amount that continues to be excessive for the time. Accurate data in many cases were not given until the fourteenth century. In the case of Córdoba, there are no exact references but it could become the most populous city in Western Europe in the tenth century, 5 probably one hundred thousand inhabitants, 6 even if its surface is not possible to be determine with precision. And, for the indirect calculation of the population, there is an unquestionable value, the extent of the walled enclosure. From there, it is possible to establish an average population density also defined by family size.
Presumably, within the city walls, there were no neighborhoods separated by wide open spaces, such as in Morocco and in several of the Christian cities in the northern half of the Peninsula. The case of the intramural surface of Tetouan occupied by the undeveloped land and the gardens, about a fifth of the total of the city is exceptional. 7 This leads us to establish a relationship between public space and residential areas. The importance of the latter is developed through the distribution of the plan of the houses, of which some are known. 8 In the case of Malaga, the walled area of 375,850 square meters, with a population of about fifteen thousand inhabitants calculated by Mosén Diego de Valera, 9 shows an average extension of the house of 150 meters for a family of six members. The distribution of Mallorca in 1229 with about 178 buildings in the Alcazaba 10 and 899,720 square meters of surface gives a housing size of 172 square meters for the same family.
Medieval residential urbanism in Europe differed greatly from Muslim urbanism. The Germanic “tunoz” occupied enormous extensions in comparison but, with all due caution, the methodology previously used is still valid since the statistical relationship between the number of residential buildings within the city walls or the city as a whole can also establish the potential number of inhabitants. Wroclaw, with a total occupancy area of 1.6 km2 in 1327 had 16,400 inhabitants. 11
Following the same calculation methodology, with the previous family members distribution, it is easy to calculate the population, during the tenth and eleventh centuries of the main Muslim cities in the Iberian Peninsula: Almería 79 hectares, Málaga 37, Granada 75, Toledo 106, Mallorca 90, and Valencia 44. Finally, Zaragoza had 47. The previous calculations show a population of twenty-six thousand inhabitants for Almeria, fifteen thousand for Malaga, twenty-six thousand for Granada, thirty-seven thousand for Toledo, twenty-five thousand for Mallorca, fifteen thousand five hundred for Valencia and seventeen thousand for Zaragoza, figures of great reliability that demonstrate the importance of these cities without reaching the exorbitant dimensions mentioned above for Constantinople (Figure 2).
Scale plans of: Toledo, Palma de Mallorca, Zaragoza, Valencia, Málaga and Almería Toledo map. 1610. El Greco. Greco Museum of Toledo. Palma de Mallorca map. Antonio Garau 1644. National Geographic Institute. Zaragoza map. 1605. Anonymous. National Library of France Profile of the City of Valencia as it was when the serene Mr. Rey Don Jaime, First of Aragon, conquered it in the year 1238 (. . .). Ortí and Mayor. 1740. (Martínez Talón, 2014) Plan of the Arab Málaga. Rafael Mitjana nineteenth century. National Hispanic Library. Plan of the City of Almería. Juan from Oviedo. 1621. Ministry of Culture / State Archives.
As it was shown before, the size and growth of cities has been the subject of research since the mid-twentieth century. Most of the works analyzed cities of great relevance, usually capitals or cities of the big urban belts, or coastal cities, since these city centers are the ones that have experienced the greatest growth historically. Nevertheless, a few medium-sized and county cities have also been the object of this type of works. 12
Many studies analyze them in base to social and economic aspects, not taking into account the influence of urban planning on the development of cities. 13 There are fewer studies that analyze the real growth of cities related to the expectations generated by their planning and subsequent development. 14 This article focuses on the analysis of urban transformations of Baza following it up today, increasing the study on the forecasts and subsequent urban developments regulated by the different plans.
As many cities, mentioned before, in the Middle Ages, Baza was a relevant medina of the Kingdom of Granada and it was considered a strategic place for communications and economy. After the Christian conquest, the city lost a large part of its population and its growth stopped. It would not be until the nineteenth century when it began to grow again. This growth was mainly developed by the appearance of a new phenomenon: the cave-house.
The main urban core of many cities had remained “petrified” since the sixteenth century. Nevertheless, some of them evolved through new Christian neighborhoods maintaining or losing population. Baza was a paradigm stagnated city until the 1950s of the twentieth century when it suffered a large urban expansion. These transformations have been the result of demographic processes and historic events but also a result of the development of the different urban plans that have influenced the current urban fabric, affecting its rich historical heritage. In 2003, the historic center was declared as Site of Cultural Interest (BIC in Spanish means the main level of protection).
To study this evolution, GIS (Geographic Information System) programs offer a useful tool. 15 The analysis is completed with the long list of sources of information that the Spanish public administration has generated over time: aerial ortho-photography, historic maps, cadastral and urban plans, census data, and so on.
Through GIS, the plans drawn in paper have been digitized, taking as main reference the current and precise cadastral cartography. The growth of the city has been analyzed overlapping this information with historic ortho-photos, comparing it during the different periods and with different plans. This shows their repercussions in the urban plot, helping to understand the current city model.
This article is structured in seven parts: an introduction of the situation of main Islamic cities in the Iberian peninsula before and after 1492, using a methodology based on their size to determine their population and analyzing their evolution after the expulsion of Jews and Moorish. The urban evolution of two main cities: Murcia and Granada are studied outlining their main features, this last until the nineteenth century. Closer, the analysis of Guadix, a city nearby Baza, and then the study case of Baza based on new criteria, a historic outline reviewing the location of the city; an analysis of the different urban plans and their results; the analysis of the phenomenon of the cave-house; the results of “planning”; and finally some brief considerations toward the future and conclusions.
Urban Evolution of Spanish Cities after Its Conquest by the Kingdoms of Castile and Aragon: Stagnation and Population Decline
The final stage of the conquest of Spain by the Catholic Monarchs is the conquest of the southern territory that we properly call Andalusia—current provinces of Jaén, Córdoba, Sevilla, Huelva, and Cádiz, geographically belonging to the Guadalquivir valley—occurred mostly during the thirteenth century. Fernando III culminated in 1248 with the conquest of Seville. In the time of Alfonso X (1252-1284), the incorporation of the entire Guadalquivir valley to Castilla was completed by conquering the city of Niebla (1262), the Bay of Cádiz, and the entire sector closest to the Strait of Gibraltar agglutinated around Jerez (1264-1266).
During the later reigns, the conquest of the Betic geographical space would be completed with the conquest of the important sites of the Strait-Tarifa (1292), Gibraltar (1309 for the first time; 1462 definitely), Algeciras (1344)—and some others like Olvera (1327), Alcalá la Real (1342), Antequera (1410) and Archidona (1462). 16 The conquest of Granada would culminate the process in 1492.
The population in Spain was dramatically decimated by two expulsions in a short period of time: the expulsion of the Jews in 1492 and the expulsion of the Moorish between 1609 and 1613. Apart from the affectation to the finances and to the productive workforce, their impact on the general population structure and therefore on the size of the cities was dramatic.
The number of expelled Jews remains the subject of controversy. The figures have ranged between forty-five thousand and three hundred fifty thousand, although the most recent research places it around fifty thousand 17 and also between seventy thousand and one hundred thousand, of which between fifty thousand and eighty thousand would come from the Crown of Castilla. 18 And another final figure says up to 170,000. 19
A century later, the expulsion of the Moorish followed. In that case, the controversial 20 figures range from 270,140 up to 320,000. 21 There are also another figure that quantifies the expulsion of Muslims, among which “there were half a million of the most qualified artisans and farmers in the country, in a total of 6.5 million inhabitants in Spain in 1500.” 22
From that moment, there is one of the great phenomena caused by the conquest: the abrupt and radical alteration of a model of settlement based on large cities but also on the existence of numerous and small rural villages and its substitution by a unique much more concentrated model of settlement but less populated. The driving force of this change was the exile or expulsion of the Muslim population, and the impossibility for the new residents (far inferior in number than the emigrated population), to keep all the places inhabited as they were during the Islamic period. 23 This information is given in the distribution documents that were established for each of the conquered cities and towns.
Before the study case, it will be analyzed two important Muslim cities and their evolution: (1) Murcia that meant a paradigm about the above-mentioned change of land use and occupation of the territory, placed in the Southeast and conquered one and a half century before the end of the “Reconquest” and (2) Granada, called “Christianopolis” during ten years after its fall (it was supposed to be the capital of the rising Empire) that was a symbol of the final resistance of the Muslim kingdoms that inhabited the Iberian Peninsula. The third-placed Guadix, in the kingdom of Granada, is shortly mentioned because it has some aspects very similar to Baza.
The East of the Peninsula: Murcia
During the Muslim period, Murcia came to have a considerable development (Figure 3). The arrival of an important amount of population to the medinas, as well as the specific economic development of the sector (Banu Lubbun in Lorca or Banu Tahir in Murcia, to name two) endured throughout the eleventh century and on the eve of the Almoravid irruption. The panorama of progress and development was enjoyed by the following generations. The demographic concentration in the population centers, both urban and rural, grew throughout the eleventh and twelfth centuries in a more remarkable way.
Map of the Andalusian Murcia of thirteenth century (Julio Navarro and Pedro Jiménez, Spanish National Research Council [CSIC]).
The landscape that the Castilians would find upon arrival was that of a very important capital, centralizing the entire Segura basin, with considerable medinas, such as those of Lorca, Orihuela, Alicante, Elche, or Mula, some rural farms scattered throughout the territory. 24 The period of Murcia splendor had been settled with the Almoravid establishment, when the city of Segura assumed the leading role throughout the area.
We must start from the idea that the kingdom of Murcia that ended up “controlling” the infant Don Alfonso in 1245 did not correspond at all with the political entity that had become very few years ago. 25 The particular capture of the nuclei of Mulas and Cartagena made two completely Christian communities settled in the very heart of the territory.
And from there, there is a transformation in the landscape generated during the eleventh to thirteenth centuries. It is now possible to observe an inverse process. The conquest led to depopulate an important part of the farthest rural nuclei of the great urban enclaves, converting the Christian Murcia kingdom into a vertebrate territory around these great urban centers, with a social organization of the space linked to the cities, that is, an urban society. 26
The first “distribution” took place between 1244 and 1264. 27 It was a restocking system by which houses and inheritance of the conquered populations were distributed to the new colons. It was followed by a 1264-1266 uprising that precipitated the Murcia Mudejar emigration process. Nevertheless, before the rebellion, there also was a massive emigration of Mudejares toward Granada or North Africa, as well as a forced displacement from some villages: in Lorca, the Moorish were almost completely evicted. The last phase of the distribution occurred between 1286 and 1331. 28
The question of the demographic and socioeconomic catastrophe of the Castilian conquest must be discussed.
The border areas were constituted for centuries as lands of huge extension, empty or semi-empty population, whose economic exploitation was based on the wide grasslands made possible by the presence of farms. The Christian kingdom of Murcia will therefore not be an exception. The figures give, for the surroundings of the capital and its valley, approximately seventy thousand inhabitants in the first decades of the thirteenth and about ten thousand at the end of the same century. 29 The demographic catastrophe was spectacular.
In general, it must be concluded that the landscape of the kingdom of Murcia after the Castilian conquest during the fourteenth, fifteenth, sixteenth, and seventeenth centuries was drawn in the process of abandonment and eviction of the rural area. There was no political interest or demographic possibilities for a re-occupation with the Islamic former intensity during the early thirteenth century. All of that was also due to the difficulties exposed before by the livestock position of the local oligarchies, inherited from a world generated in the border. 30
From the Granada Kingdom: The Capital
The city of Granada culminates the process said above after its conquest by the Catholic Monarchs in 1492. The population data of the city of Granada shown by different studies are very different. The Nasrid Granada, apart from its beauty, was one of the most populated cities at the end of the fifteenth century in direct rivalry with Constantinople and had no peer in Spain. 31 The data oscillate from two hundred thousand souls, which an embassy of the Crown of Aragon said to the “200,000 armed men who, coming from various places, came to congregate in their enclosure.” 32 It is feasible that during the siege of the city by the Catholic Monarchs, around 150,000 people were concentrated, which confirms the fact that, during the last years of the reconquest, Granada had to be a refuge for thousands of Muslims from all conquered lands. 33
The population of Granada at the end of the fifteenth century should have been between eighty thousand and one hundred thousand people. 34 The present study agrees with the first of the figures, about eighty thousand souls. It is based on the number of homes and all the historical data offered during centuries (Figure 4).
Arab Granada’s map.
As regards the city morphology, there were few urban transformations during the early years after the conquest. The population had to remain, as long as it was controlled, because they knew well the territory and they were needed to maintain the productive and tax structures. But the population that had positions of political responsibility or were related to the Nasrid family were invited to leave the city because they were considered dangerous. 35 Their residences would be occupied by the noble Castilian families.
The amount of population arriving with the conquerors could occupy the houses of the Jews that were evicted with the Decree of the Alhambra or Edict from Granada within a period of four months, extended by ten more days (until August 10). The city would remain stable in size and population. A postcapitulation document speaks of four hundred uninhabited houses, 36 which would give a population deficit of about 2,400 people. Almost a decade later, the minutes of the Town Hall of December 6, 1499, say that the neighborhoods of the Alcazaba, the Puerta de Elvira, and Axares are depopulated, with many empty houses that suffer looting and whose doors were carried away, also tiles and wood. That is why it was agreed to put guards that prevented it. 37
The first urban transformations took place in religious and public buildings driven by social groups with greater purchasing power. There was a center that stood out from the rest, the Plaza Nueva. This unified religion, commerce, and government. In addition, there were secondary streets around it with religious buildings, educational institutions, squares, noble residences, and public hospitals joined to the Bib-rambla square. There also was another secondary element in another nucleus, the Cathedral. Around it, the University and the Archbishop’s Palace were arranged. 38
The census of 1587 shows an amount of 8,737 neighbors that meant a figure of around forty thousand inhabitants. During the first quarter of the seventeenth century, the number of homes in the city grew, while important urban reforms were carried out. 39 The general approach of the reforms responded to a double impulse that is explained in detail below:
Institutional transformations focused mainly on Chancery, Royal Hospital, and Madrasa. The first of the institutions controlled the administration, giving justice and collecting taxes, among other tasks. The second responded to a new policy that was established, that of the “Social Well Being,” which began to establish relief organizations in the cities so that would be no begging. The Madrasa, the Islamic university since the fourteenth century became the seat of the first Town Hall (Sala de los Caballeros) under the name of Casa del Cabildo.
Religious transformations focused mainly on religious buildings (mosques, cathedrals, convents, and churches), on the perimeter of the wall or in the area outside the walls as the Monastery of San Jerónimo and Santo Domingo. 40 The cathedral of Granada located in a focal area of the civitas, the protection area that replaced the forum and was close to the archbishop’s residence. 41 In addition, they began to build on the foundations of these mosques, Christian religious buildings to demonstrate the new society. Thus, the parish of San Gil and Santa Ana (1537), the church of San José (1525), San Juan de los Reyes in 1520, and the parish church of San Pedro and San Pablo rise on a plot where there was previously another church, built in the Mosque of the baths that was located in the Albayzin neighborhood.
In the new urban morphology, between the Monastery and the Door of San Jerónimo and the Cathedral, an urban axis was generated representing one of the most important palatial lines of the late sixteenth century with designs that range from the first Renaissance attempts (School of Noble Girls) until the most advanced ones of the end of sixteenth century as the Palace of Caicedo. To this, it must be added constructions of educational nature such as the Jesuit College, current Faculty of Law, or sanitation such as the San Juan de Dios Hospital, which sought the perfect city in the beauty and health of the new humanistic ideals. 42
On November 1, 1570, it took place in the city “the Moorish Expulsion,” as a result of “the rebellion of the Alpujarras,” a traumatic event for the future of the city as a whole. According to the Marquis de Mondéjar, For a kingdom like this has to be depopulated, where the fruits of the earth would be lost, which was so appropriate for that nation that used to live between mountains and to sustain itself with very little, and so unfit for Christians.
43
On one hand, the old districts lost population; on the other, la Duquesa quarter (1525) located between San Jerónimo and the Bibalmazda gate, and las Angustias (1545), an urban focus around the Church of the Virgen de las Angustias, were Christian neighborhoods (Figure 5) that grew, thanks to the new economic and professional activities linked to the new administrative and religious order that were developed in their field, as well as the proximity of agricultural production in their meadow. It made the extramural neighborhoods continue with their growth and expansion process. On the early years of the seventeenth century, the Magdalena, San Antón, and la Virgen neighborhoods were added.
Granada. Plan of urban historical evolution. 1988. Bosque Maurel.
In spite of that, the expulsion of the Jews and Moriscos created an economic and demographic problem in the city, provoking a period of slow and prolonged decline. This would be reflected in the population censuses of the late sixteenth century. 44 Before the seventeenth century, the Albaicin, “now almost destroyed,” would have four thousand neighbors. 45
The loss of the American colonies during the first quarter of the nineteenth century ruined the Grenadian manufacturing industry of ribbons to export. 46 Shortly before the middle of the century, the Madoz Dictionary says that the houses of Granada “according to the most accurate statistical news,” were 10,041 and the official data said that were inhabited by 14,225 neighbors and 61,610 souls.
From the Granada Kingdom: Guadix in the Nearby Wide Valley of Guadix-Baza
Baza is located in the wide valley Guadix-Baza. In that way, both cities have many similarities and it is worth to make a reference to the evolution of Guadix.
There is no reliable data about the Muslim invasion of Acci, although it seems that the city did not initially have important transformations. Only the settlement of a military minority in the Alcazaba area. The Spanish-Goth city lasted throughout the eighth century and perhaps during part of the ninth. It is throughout this century that a slow and progressive Islamic transformation took place which, already in the tenth century, was reflected in the urban transformation of the Alcazaba area. This included the castle with a large esplanade that will serve as a main square, plus the close area, all surrounded by a fortified fence. 47
Since the twelfth century, Wadi-as was a fully defined Muslim city with a medina whose territorial scope is perfectly bounded by a wall and that included the main mosque, the Jewish quarter, the maqaber (cemetery), the sewer, and baths.
From that moment until the fourteenth and fifteenth centuries, a ring of suburbs was built around the medina (some on the remains of previous settlements) that is also fenced for two reasons: for better protection and for the need for more rigorous control of the tax collection of the city on the goods that were traded there.
The main suburbs were the Arrabal of the door of Granada, Arrabal of the Almoreja, Arrabal of the Magdalena, Arrabal of the door of the Rambla or of Santiago, whose origins were located in the Roman and Visigothic periods, in any case all of them pre-Islamic. The Arrabal del Cadi, Tollir, or Santa Ana was separated from the rest of the city until the sixteenth century. An indication of this autonomy was the fact that, after the reconquest, in the summer of 1490, when it was decided the expulsion of the defeated Muslims and Jews from the medina, they were given two options to move: to the Vega, the “Sened” or to this suburb that, therefore, it ended up being called the Guadix Moorish quarter. Finally, the Arrabal de Acoanas that would have disappeared when the Christians arrived in 1489. The population of the city at that time was between seven thousand and eight thousand neighbors, very similar to Baza. But its later evolution was very different (Figure 6).
Guadix: The medieval city, medina, and suburbs.
As we will see later, in the case study of Baza, Guadix has a caves’ area. This last is much bigger, about 200 hectares of land related to a historic center of 161.21 hectares. It is considered the European capital of “caves,” because of its 2,491 caves, of which there are 1,772 for housing. Baza have only 414 caves where people live (Table 1). Their number, scale of land occupation, and the way they are traditionally regulated by planning were different.
The city of Guadix has been the subject of numerous studies, from Acci, the roman city, 48 to the Islamic city, its transformations during the fifteenth century and its religious architecture. 49 Also, its urban and architectural transformations, 50 its morphology in relation to Baza, 51 and the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries. 52 Perhaps it would be worth a detailed study, such as the one proposed in this work, from the point of view of urban planning.
Going one step further, this work will study the city of Baza, taking into account the evolution along its History from the point of view of its master plans and urban regulations.
The Study Case of Baza (Granada): Background and Context
Baza is placed in the northeast of the province of Granada, Spain, 844 meters above sea level (Figure 7). Its location is supposed to have been founded around s. VIII by the Arabs, the medina Basta. In Ibero-Roman and Visigoth periods, it was located in the nearby Cerro (Hill) del Cepero and was known as Basti. 53 It had been a strategic enclave since antiquity and controlled the main routes.
Location of Baza (Spain and province of Granada) Base: Google Maps.
It was relevant to the economy of the Kingdom of Granada during the Middle Ages, thanks to agriculture, livestock, and crafts, 54 being during the fifteenth century an essential place for the conquest of the Catholic Monarchs. It was taken by the Christians in 1489 after a long and costly siege that finished after the capitulations granted to its inhabitants. 55 The estimate population during the Muslim period was ten thousand inhabitants. 56 As it can be seen, it was a medium size settlement compared with some cities analyzed before. From its conquest, Baza was ruled by the direct administration of the Crown due to its strategic importance. Because of this, it was granted a series of laws for its government. 57
Under the jurisdiction of its town council, there were eight towns in the surroundings. After the Reconquest, it was the capital of an extensive judicial district of the Kingdom of Granada, the second one of territorial size of Andalusia. 58 In 1492, an Abbey was founded in the city to manage local religious affairs and provide autonomy to it.
Then, the city had a big size. In its morphology, there stood a powerful citadel with towers, located on a small hill (Figure 8). To the east of the fortress, in its lowest area, it was the medina, totally walled and defended by moats. Inside the medina, there were the main mosque, stores, corn change, baths, furnaces, mills, tanneries, and so on. Outside the walls of the main core, formed by the citadel and the medina, there were a series of suburbs; up to a total of five and they had mosques, bathrooms, mills, ovens, and other different buildings. 59
Hypothesis for the shape of the city during the fifteenth and seventeenth centuries.
The Muslim cemetery was located halfway between the city and one of its main suburbs, the one of Hédar. It was closed by the Christians, who carried their burials out in the religious enclosures. 60
After the conquest, the Muslim inhabitants maintained their properties, thanks to the capitulations granted by the Catholic Monarchs. They only evicted the citadel and a part of the medina. However, in 1490, the capitulations were suspended, beginning a process of expulsion of the former inhabitants, confiscating all their properties which were distributed and granted to new Christian settlers by the Crown. 61
The Book of Distribution made a list of the houses that there were in the Almedina and the Alcazaba and the suburbs of Marzuela, Calacajar, Churra, Argedid, Arrabales de Arriba, Ollerías, Hédar or Hidar, and so on, which make a total of 1,577 houses, of which three hundred were demolished for the fortress and citadel, so that 1,277 houses remained. 62
The arrival of the Christians meant a big amount of urban reforms to adapt the city to the Castilian policies. For example, mosques were converted into churches and new squares; gates were opened; and streets were widened. To guarantee these new reforms, ordinances for carpenters, masons, and master builders of Baza were created, stipulating the conditions for new constructions. 63
An element that affected significantly to the urban fabric of Baza was the earthquake that occurred on September 30, 1531, in which nine hundred houses were totally destroyed, while those that remained standing had visible damage in their structures that threatened to ruin them. However, some important parts of the city (starting with the citadel and following churches, monasteries, and homes), of Baza and its surroundings, soon were repaired. 64 The caves may have been used as a temporary shelter.
From the fifteenth century to the twentieth century, a big number of religious institutions arrived there, building new churches and convents. Some of these institutions were created by direct orders of the Catholic Monarchs, others from private noble sponsorships to ensure the implantation of the Christian faith in the city. 65 In addition to these buildings, manor houses and palaces of the oligarchy appeared. Among them, it stands out the Palace of the Enríquez-Luna that started its construction in 1502. This family built, under his patronage and attached to its palace, the Church and the Monastery of San Jerónimo in 1502 too. 66
The former policy of transformation for urban spaces kept on during the sixteenth century. Public buildings were built such as the new corn change, the fish markets, the butcher’s shops, the town hall. In 1526, the town council was informed of the visit of Carlos V to the city, initiating a program of urban improvements to beautify the city before the possible visit, which finally did not take place.
During the seventeenth century, the urban policy was similar (Figure 8). The fountain of the Caños Dorados was built at the entrance to the city, also the minor Seminary. The old Muslim cemetery became a recreational place that would end up being the current park of the Alameda. 67 In the last third of the seventeenth century, the citadel began to lose military importance, granting the town hall licenses to build houses attached to it. The population of the city was estimated as 6,400 inhabitants in 1672. 68
With the arrival of the Enlightenment to Baza, in the eighteenth century, new urban policies were developed. 69 On one hand, the external reform was proposed to improve roads and communications. Many public spaces were added around the Camino de Levante (current avenue of Andalusia), such as the Alameda Park and the Eras Square. On the other hand, internal reforms were proposed for cleaning up the city and to improve its hygiene and services. New squares were opened, and buildings in poor condition were rebuilt such as the one for corn exchange. Some others were built like the public granary. During the Baroque, a series of main houses with curved eaves were built, examples that are still preserved in the city. The citadel and the walls of the medina lost their military use.
The Cadastre of Ensenada of 1752 shows the properties and economic fabric at that time. The economy focused on agriculture and livestock but it also stood out the manufactures derived from these: mining and exploitation of saltpeter. 70 The population was 7,740 inhabitants at the end of the century. 71
During the nineteenth century, Baza grew strongly, reaching 11,992 inhabitants in 1897. 72 The first cave-houses appeared (Figure 9) because the city did not have buildings enough to absorb this growth. 73 Many small rural settlements and scattered houses appeared too. The mining gained importance in the economy of the city.
(Left) Map of the city of 1864 on topographical basis (from historic maps from the Geographic Center of the Army of Spain). (Right) Map of 1957 (from aerial photograph of the National Plan of Aerial Orthophotography (PNOA)).
Since 1800, many large public works have been carried out. It cannot be ignored important historic events, such as the War of Independence (Napoleon’s wars in Spain) between 1808 and 1814, which meant the plundering of the city, especially its religious buildings. After that, Public buildings were built, such as the bullring next to the Alameda Park, the new prison. A new cemetery was also built on the outskirts of the city, ending with the burials in the collapsed religious enclaves. In 1894, the arrival of the railway linked Baza to near places such as Guadix and Almendricos.
The city lost its political influence when the judicial district of Baza was eliminated after the Spanish distribution of provinces held in 1833. In 1851, the Abbey of Baza was suppressed, losing the city its religious power influence. 74
The city began its demographic growth in the twentieth century when small local industry, mainly esparto grass, needed workers. A rural exodus occurred in the mid century, when the population moved from small villages and farms to Baza city. Nevertheless, the urban center did not change because the phenomenon of the cave-house developed greatly (Figure 9), maintaining its urban layout since the sixteenth century. 75 The relevant changes were the widening and opening of public spaces in the old medina and its suburbs; small perimeter growths of the city that would be limited to the construction of houses in the streets surrounding its outer belt; the public spaces generated during the Enlightenment in the main accesses; and the transfer of the cemetery to its current location outside the city. The roads improved with the national route in early 1900s. On the contrary, in 1985, the railway was closed because of its low profitability.
It was from the mid-century when the city of Baza (Figure 10) began to experience great changes and urban transformations. These changes would range from the paving of streets and the installation of public supplies, to the modification of its urban layout. They were established by the different urban plans approved up today. This growth is a paradox considering that in the year 2017 the city decreased demographically, being counted 20,642 inhabitants. 76
Panoramic of the city in 1901. On the right, it can be observed the railway line and extensive gardens, a border between the caves’ area and the city (from archive of the Archeological Town Museum of Baza).
Contemporary Urban Development
The development of Baza can be divided, from its origins, into two clear areas: the main urban core and “The Caves” area.
The City Center
The beginning of urban expansion in mid-twentieth century
Until 1971, Baza did not have a rigorous urban regulation for its growth, nor a classification of the soil that distinguished between urban or rural (not developable). Therefore, until then, any owner could build on their land regardless of its location, as long as it was inside their farm and did not invade public roads.
This circumstance led to the growth of a big amount of buildings scattered throughout the township and to the creation of housing in the suburbs, whose promoters built their own road not taking into account the “planning” for the city. In 1957, the city center size was 40.46 hectares. In the southeast area of the city, the first growths were developed through social housing promoted by public administration and patronages. They were located around the main communication routes. In these conditions, up to a total of ten areas were built, adding up to twenty-four blocks and 558 single-family homes.
During this period, large local infrastructures were also undertaken, such as public spaces, the construction of high schools, the food market, the municipal market, the new local slaughterhouse, the new fish market, doctors’ offices, schools, and other public buildings.
However, these urban growths contrast with the demographic evolution. In the second-third of the twentieth century, Baza suffered a strong emigration to the most powerful industrial areas in Spain, mainly Catalonia. In 1950, there were 23,642 inhabitants, decreasing progressively until 1971, when the city reached a minimum of 20,199.
The Urban Plan of 1971
The Act for Bases of Local Regime of July 17, 1945, required a plan for each municipality. Between 1947 and 1949, a survey of the city was developed at 1/500 scale as a basis for the future plan. The Law of Local Regime of December 16, 1950, in its article 134, forced the villages to have in three years “an Urban Plan that includes the reform, widening, sanitation and beautification of the urban tissue.”
The City Council commissioned the City Architect Juan de Dios Wilhelmi Castro to elaborate the urban plan in 1951. It was not applied until 1968 due to disagreements among Council and architect. On that date, the drafting of the first urban plan of Baza was entrusted to the architect Rafael Herrerías Ocete. It was passed in January 1971. 77
The plan classified the city center and two annexed villages as urban, establishing the eastern zone for urban growth since the existence of the railroad to the west was a barrier. An industrial zone was established in the northeast area next to the city separated by a large green area. It classified 146.38 hectares as urban land ignoring the area of the caves (Figure 11).
(Left) Limits of the urban fabric (Plan 1971) consolidated in 1985 (right).
As for heritage, the plan only had a list of monuments and major buildings such as the Major Church or the Palace of the Abrantes (now of the Enríquez). However, it did not regulate any specific protection. Because of this, in 1971, the convent of the Trinidad (from the eighteenth century) was demolished to build a block of seven floors. In 1980, an updating plan was made that did not come into force. This had a heritage catalog which included the relevant convent of San Francisco; however, it was demolished in 1982.
The plan was to align and widen several streets of the historic center to make traffic lighter. It raised, for example, the opening and widening of the Callejón (Alley) del Barco, by demolishing buildings, such as a baroque manor house from the eighteenth century.
Discordant blocks of four and five floors were built throughout the city (Figure 12). It was due to the fact that the height of the building depended on the width of the new projected roads. A wider street meant a higher block. For this reason, the construction of high blocks was allowed on streets that were planned to be widened, but which definitely were not.
To the left: High building in downtown as a result of the plan of 1971.
The Plan used a detailed map of zoning based on a plan of plots and streets at scale 1/2000 as a main instrument to apply the town planning. This plan also included the new alignments of streets and extensions proposed. It lacked of a reliable topographic map that would allow locating, correctly, the plots and buildings of the city.
In the areas for growing, a series of main routes were projected based on a reticular model not taking into account the existing heritage buildings. In all the outer belt of the new growths, a ring road was planned trying to avoid the heavy traffic in the historic center. Eventually, it was not built.
This plan would end up surpassed at the end of the 1970s, as the city experienced a growth greater than expected. For this reason, in 1979, complementary norms were sanctioned. The previous urban perimeter was extended, including the new growths and the areas of caves (Figure 11). In 1980, the provincial government of Granada drafted the information phase for a new Plan adapted to the Law of Land Regime and Urban Planning of 1975. That plan was not passed either. 78 In that period, the urban center experienced the greatest growth in its history, reaching a size of 123.25 hectares in 1985.
The Subsidiary Plan of 1984
In 1983, the works for drafting a new plan began. It was passed in May 1984. Its forecast lifetime was twenty years. One of its best innovations was the accuracy of its plans, precise enough to leave no doubt about the location of the plots and buildings. This plan fully recognized the heritage values of the city of Baza, highlighting the importance of its historic center (Figure 13), recognizing the complexity of its arrangement. This regulation should be carried out through a Special Plan of Reform, including the caves’ area. The widening and opening of streets that the previous plan had projected (that crossed the historic center endangering many heritage elements) were eliminated.
(Left) Urban perimeter in the (Subsidiary Plan 1984) consolidated in 2010 (right). From an aerial photograph (PNOA 2010).
The plan included plots for urban developing, inherited from the previous plan, as urban ground. Also included dispersed settlements of the municipality. It established suburban agricultural areas as developable land. The housing forecast was of 2,100. It fixed 245.92 hectares as urban land and foresaw 67.84 hectares as developable land in the north, east, and south zones.
The Plan prioritized the urbanization of nonbuilt areas within the city before expanding urban land. An average density of thirty-eight houses per hectare was established in the urban and developable land, except for the historic center where it was established of fifty and in the caves area of twenty-five.
The Plan also gave priority to the classification of land for the construction of single-family housing in suburbs. It proposed the commercial use in growing areas near the historic center, by building blocks, trying to make it less dense. The urban core was crossed by two heavy traffic roads, the national 342 and the county 323. It planned a peripheral beltway to make the traffic flow more smoothly.
Since the 1970s, lots of industrial buildings were built along the two main roads away from the ground ordered by the 1971 plan. The Subsidiary Plan created a delimitation of the first industrial areas of the city, based on what has already been developed “programming” its growth. In 1986, the Hospital de Baza was built next to one of the newly established industrial areas serving the whole surrounding region.
Finally, in 1987, the Special Plan for the Reform of the Historic Center of Baza (PERICH) was sanctioned. It was a regulation that especially watched over the renovation of the area and the protection and recovery of its heritage, including a detailed catalog of protected properties and the way they had to be recovered.
The historic center presented urban issues such as bad connection between the historic city and the new expansion areas. To solve them, the Urban Plan delimited twenty-eight intervention areas, of which only five were executed.
The PERICH included a series of proposals to encourage the owners and inhabitants of the city to get involved in its success. It posed, for example, façade competitions or prizes for the best rehabilitation.
During the plan’s lifetime, many works of rehabilitation were carried out throughout the city. The main developers were the Junta de Andalucía (transformation programs of infra housing and regional rehabilitation); the City Council, recovering historic buildings for public use; and private owners, through rehabilitations for residential and commercial use.
Regarding the new constructions, the typologies and uses for buildings were limited. They had to be based on the traditional ones as well as the heights of the building. This prevented the appearance of new discordant buildings as in the previous decades. A total of 255 houses were built within the historic center.
In 2001, the historic center of the city was delimited in a very similar way to the PERICH. It was initiated a procedure to ask for its declaration as a Place of Cultural Interest. It was finally declared in 2003.
The Urban Plan of 2010
In 2010, the current Urban Plan of Baza took effect. It is a modern plan that regulates all needy aspects to govern the future of the city. It has an expected lifetime from fifteen to twenty years. It makes a diagnosis of the state of the city related to social issues. The main aspects dealt with are as follows.
On the territory, it highlights the demographic decrease of the area, the decline in economic activity, and the depopulation of rural settlements in favor of the main city. It also shows the decay of the interior regions in favor of those of the littoral and the urban agglomerations. It stands out the good current communications, mainly the A-92 and the A-334.
About Urban ground, it analyses the urban structure, the historical development, the roads, the land uses, the infrastructures, and so on, and also the need for future growth.
Related to zoning, the plan studies the conditions of the buildings, typologies, heights, age, state, and so on. The consolidated and developing urban areas are analyzed, reaching a total of thirty-five homogenous zones, diagnosing each of them.
Another condition for the formulation of the new plan is the execution of the previous Subsidiary Plan. It carries out a measurement of its outcomes success. The new plan has maintained all the development carried out by the previous one assuming the one already planned and not yet executed. It provides ground to develop 3,500 new homes, 1,800 for urban land, and 1,700 for developable land.
Finally, it also intends to improve the high densities and heights into the nonbuilt urban areas, as well as reduce the deficit of free and public spaces, establishing a reservation of 45 to 55 m2 per dwelling. The typology of block housing has been standardized as usual in unconsolidated urban areas and areas for future growth.
The Plan has classified 329.91 hectares as urban land and planned 178.98 hectares for future urbanization (Figure 14). The new growths have been set around the perimeter of the city on the north, south and east sides, and along the old N-342 or road to Murcia, today a large avenue.
Current urban developed areas (overlapping Googlemaps 2018 aerial picture).
Between 2010 and 2011, urban renewal works were carried out on many streets and public spaces in the city (Figure 15), especially those related to heritage elements and José de Mora Avenue (one of the main economic arteries). The works supposed a complete transformation of all these urban public spaces, giving priority to pedestrian and landscaped spaces, traditionally used for traffic and parking. A remarkable goal was the revaluation of heritage.
Current panorama of the city after the great growths (image taken from the Cuevas del Cerrico).
Another problem today solved is the diversion of the heavy traffic roads that crossed the city, after the construction of the A-92 at the end of the twentieth century and the variant of the A-334 de Baza in 2007.
The Cave’s Area
At the beginning of the nineteenth century, a model of fast and economic housing began to be standardized for the working-class needs. The cave-houses were dwellings excavated in the land and enabled as homes. 79
This typology was introduced in a large area close to the urban center, on its west side and separated by a large strip of land for orchards. They were built there because of the topography, steep and with large differences in elevation, offering the right conditions to cut the ground and to excavate the caves.
The “Hafas” were caves excavated by the Almohads and existed in the northern part of the province of Granada (Guadix, Baza and Tierras de Huéscar) between the twelfth and thirteenth centuries. They were built for defensive purposes in the most rugged areas and inaccessible to the enemy, on the cliffs of the hills near the rivers. 80 Once the Moors were expelled, the architectural typology was preserved and lasted in time until today. In 1531, after the earthquake mentioned before, they could have been used by people to live while repairing the buildings.
The province of Granada reaches almost half of the total Troglodyte Habitat in Spain with more than thirteen thousand families living in caves in the early 1960s. In the Guadix county, there were almost ten thousand caves, of which two-thirds were inhabited as households. 81
In Baza, these settlements were registered for the first time in 1810. From that moment, they were growing until the 1950s. In 1972, they were recorded 1,073 82 ; currently, there are 1,036 inventoried caves within the urban land. 83 The area where these houses are located is known as “The Caves,” grouping eight neighborhoods. Traditionally, it was considered a marginal area, a character that was accentuated by the physical separation of the city by railway since the late nineteenth century. In 1957, the extension of the caves area was 63.40 hectares and kept growing and transforming its landscape.
The caves were excavated individually and disorderly, without taking into account urban facilities or management aspects. The result is the chaotic and disorganized urban planning because its random and improvised execution.
The only premise to build a cave was the inclination of the ground and suitable characteristics (clay, sandstone, marl, limestone, conglomerate, or compacted rock). The only precaution was not to invade the neighboring caves following the fronts of caves defined by the slope of the land. Usually, the caves were accessed from a front yard where a stone wall was built to contain the ground and, occasionally, there could be auxiliary constructions attached to the front.
The excavation of caves came to an end by the mid-twentieth century. In the following decades, rooms to place the kitchen, toilets, and other facilities were attached to the caves. After that, the massive construction of buildings proliferated in an uncontrolled manner and, today, has hidden or replaced much of the traditional caves.
The first Urban Plan of 1971 made only the following reference to the Caves: There is a neighborhood where there are about thousands caves, which lodge about 5,000 people, they are not typical at all and are rather unhealthy housing, although for the needy classes their accommodation is acceptable because they are isolated from the cold and heat.
84
Nevertheless, it did not try to organize that area.
In 1979, the Plan was updated through complementary regulations that included cave areas as urban land, but as a result of its lack of control, a big amount of new buildings were built over the caves in 1985.
The Subsidiary Plan of 1984 delimited the whole area, including it within the urban land. Its regulation was postponed to a Special Plan that was never drafted. This was due to the urban complexity that the area presented. The area was defined as “a large sector of urban land originated by various illegal and marginal settlements developed in an anarchic and uncontrolled manner but which are currently an active part in the socio-economic activity of the city.” 85
Because of the absence of the Special Plan, a temporary rule was applied imposing two conditions: first of all, not to invade the roads, free spaces and public easements; and second, the typology of two-floor buildings. The results were the construction of new buildings in the cave area without a project for the city as a whole.
The 2010 General Plan has been the first detailed ordinance of the “The Caves” area. It has classified most of the land as isolated single-family housing, except for small developments of other preexisting types (Figure 14).
This Plan fixed as main objectives to improve (1) the connections of the communication routes with the city center, (2) free spaces, and (3) to eliminate the marginality. To solve the complex situation, it established the need to elaborate a Special Reform Plan, which will probably be sanctioned in a few months.
Nowadays, the image of the caves has improved after the interventions carried out by the City Council, which has reordered some urban spaces and has improved roads, infrastructures, and public facilities. The barrier that supposed the railroad has disappeared after closing the service. In its place, a wide avenue has been arranged with two traffic lanes, pedestrian zones, and landscaped areas. The old train station and its surroundings, which occupy an area of 3.2 hectares, have been transformed into an area that lodges the weekly market and the fair.
A surprising circumstance is that only in three municipalities of the county (Gorafe, Benalúa and Marchal, small villages), the Master Plan organizes the cave areas and their construction. Guadix, the municipality with the largest number of caves in the region and also in Spain, establishes its planning through a Special Plan.
Results of “Planning”
Baza had an estimated population of ten thousand inhabitants, months before the conquest. After the Christian Reconquest, the city began a constant demographic decline, reaching a minimum of 4,403 inhabitants in 1717. From that year, the population began to grow, accelerating the rate in the mid-nineteenth century, reaching its historic peak in 1950 with 23,450 inhabitants (Figure 16).
Population’s evolution from 1489 (Statistics National Institute (INE)).
The cave-house phenomenon absorbed most of the population growth during the nineteenth century, allowing the city center to have small growths and transformations, remaining almost intact since the sixteenth century. In 1957, the cave area size was 63.40 hectares. Compared with 40.46 of urban ground, the cave area exceeded the consolidated center of the village by 56 percent.
The end of the 1950s of the twentieth century is considered to be the beginning of the urban growth of Baza. These growths were not under the control of any urban planning. They were located around the main preexisting roads.
The 1971 Plan had an expansionist approach proposing forceful reforms of the historic center. It was totally wrong by ignoring the already consolidated area of caves, which was more than half of the urban areas. The city then had about 19,990 inhabitants, which meant a demographic decrease of 17.3 percent compared with 1950.
Fortunately, none of the major reforms of the historic center, which would put heritage elements at risk, were fulfilled. Even so, many buildings were built in traditional environments that have created strong visual and environmental impacts. Buildings of great value were also demolished to be replaced by new developments, including two important convents (Figure 12).
As regards urban growth, the plan foresaw a future size of 146.38 hectares. Eight years after its sanction, the plan was exceeded, so the urban land had to be extended by means of complementary rules to assume the cave area and the new growth. In 1985, the city reached a size of 201.28 hectares.
The Subsidiary Plan assumed all the soils classified in the former plan and previous complementary regulations, legalizing the growths that had arisen without regulation. This new planning was successful because, for the first time, the planned growth took place in soils classified for that purpose. However, it was not fully developed. This Plan was protectionist related to heritage betting on urban regeneration.
However, the density of thirty-eight houses per hectare of dwellings established by this plan was exceeded. In urban areas, an average density of seventy-three houses per hectare was reached. Nevertheless, that condition was fulfilled in the new areas of developable land, reaching an average of 30.7 houses per hectare.
More weaknesses of this Plan were reservations for public spaces (green areas, squares, etc.) and endowments (schools, sports, health services) in urban areas with a rate of only 6 m2 of ground per house. The ideal one would have been between 35 and 65 m2. The Plan tried to fulfill this deficit with the new developments during the last years of its validity, providing reservations of 57 m2 of land per house.
The Subsidiary Plan classified 245.92 hectares as urban land, of which 146.17 were urban land, and 67.87 for “The Cave’s” area; 67.83 hectares were defined as developable land; that is, it forecasts that the city could achieve a maximum of 313.75 hectares. In 2010, the city size was 279.43, so it did not reach the maximum possible.
The Urban Plan of 2010 should be considered the most complete urban regulation of Baza throughout History. Because its proposal was to enhance social participation, and the resulting document was adapted highly to the needs of the city.
Regarding heritage protection, which was compulsory after the approval of the Historic Site, the Plan has fulfilled the expectations, drafting the corresponding regulations and elaborating a detailed catalog of buildings and sites to protect.
It has classified 329.91 hectares as urban land, with main housing and tertiary uses and 178.98 hectares as developable land. Therefore, following the plan, the city could reach 508.89 hectares in 2030.
As it has been shown, since 1950, Baza has suffered continuous demographic decline (Figure 16), in spite of the constant increase in size of its urban core (Figure 17). Related to processes of gentrification, it would therefore be necessary to reconsider whether this urban growth has been appropriate and necessary (Table 2).
Evolution of the consolidated urban area by years (down). Years in which plans were changed have been taken as reference.
The change in the size of homes is one aspect to assess. In Baza, in 1950, the average household was 4.08 people per house, coming down to 2.75 in 2011. Generally speaking, in Spain, these data experience a continuous decrease. The current rate is 2.49 people. 86 This should be linked to the new types of family, which means that today, in a single dwelling, fewer people live than in previous decades. A greater number of houses are needed to lodge the same amount of population.
Moreover, the historic center has suffered strong loss of population that is moving toward the developing areas. It is mostly due to accessibility problems of traditional dwellings besides to their habitability conditions, since most of them require major rehabilitation works to be adapted to today’s living standards.
Many businesses have moved to the main streets of the new neighborhoods with better communications, wider street, and young population, leaving empty commercial areas of the historic center and its surroundings.
Conclusions Looking Toward the Future
Looking at the future, we must highlight three additional elements that influence both the urban core and the cave settlements (Figure 18):
1. First of all, the fact that the population of Baza continues its decrease and that the urban center is the area that is further depopulated. These facts must be taken into account to assess where planned growths are necessary. Perhaps they should be reconsidered, making a new formulation that takes into account the demographic and social phenomena related to the city and the region.
The city of Baza in 1957 (left) and 2018 (right) (perimeter of the consolidated urban land [aerial photograph, PNOA and Googlemaps]).
Recently, the City Council has carried out a project of urban and social regeneration for the historic center, using as a main driving force the citizen participation and whose objective is to cut the exodus of young families to peripheries avoiding gentrification and revitalizing the urban core.
2. Second, the proliferation of a big amount of illegal constructions outside the urban land. Most of them have been built in the area of the fertile plain. 87 This is a serious drawback to environmental, landscape, and urban services. These constructions are possible for agrarian purposes, but not residential.
Traditionally, in this area, there have been some small and isolated farmhouses, the homes of farmers, and warehouses on farms of medium and big size. The structure of the property in the zone of the fertile plain is distributed mainly in smallholdings. Since the 1980s, hundreds of homes have been located facing the passivity of the administration that has not stopped them. This situation must be limited before an irreversible negative impact occurs.
3. Third, the cave’s area has become a tourist resort, not only in Baza but also in Guadix (in a much bigger amount but with a less develop planning regulation) and the north of the province de Granada, evolving from slums to second residential areas and housing to hire for tourist, because of their singularity. They are an increasing importance in the economy of the region.
Footnotes
Declaration of Conflicting Interests
The author(s) declared no potential conflicts of interest with respect to the research, authorship, and/or publication of this article.
Funding
The author(s) received no financial support for the research, authorship, and/or publication of this article.
