Villa Lugano is a '' barrio'' (neighbourhood) in

Buenos Aires Buenos Aires ( or ; ), officially the Autonomous City of Buenos Aires ( es, link=no, Ciudad Autónoma de Buenos Aires), is the capital and primate city of Argentina. The city is located on the western shore of the Río de la Plata, on South ...

Argentina Argentina (), officially the Argentine Republic ( es, link=no, República Argentina), is a country in the southern half of South America. Argentina covers an area of , making it the second-largest country in South America after Brazil, th ...

, located in the south of the city. It has a population of approximately 114,000 people. It is delimited by Avenida Eva Perón,

Avenida General Paz Avenida General Paz (official name Ruta Nacional A001 - National Route A001) is a beltway freeway surrounding the city of Buenos Aires. Roughly following the boundary between the city and Buenos Aires Province, it is one of the few motorways in A ...

, Calle José Barros Pazos, Avenida Lisandro de la Torre, Avenida Coronel Roca and Avenida Escalada. To the south-east it limits with

La Matanza Partido La Matanza ('The Slaughter' in Spanish) is a '' partido'' (county or department) located in the urban agglomeration of Greater Buenos Aires, Buenos Aires Province, Argentina. This provincial subdivision had 1,775,272 inhabitants (at the 2010 Cen ...

. Generally a working-class neighbourhood, Villa Lugano is characterised by its numerous

public housing Public housing is a form of housing tenure in which the property is usually owned by a government authority, either central or local. Although the common goal of public housing is to provide affordable housing, the details, terminology, def ...

complexes built in the late 20th century, such as Barrio General Manuel Savio (commonly known as ''Lugano 1 y 2''), Barrio Cardenal Antonio Samoré, Barrio Cardenal Copello, and Barrio Comandante Luis Piedrabuena.

History

Villa Lugano was founded in 1908, when Swiss citizen José Ferdinando Francisco Soldati (founder of Sociedad Comercial del Plata) established a settlement named for his hometown of

Lugano Lugano (, , ; lmo, label=Ticinese dialect, Ticinese, Lugan ) is a city and municipality in Switzerland, part of the Lugano District in the canton of Ticino. It is the largest city of both Ticino and the Italian-speaking southern Switzerland. Luga ...

. Soldati was born on 30 May 1864 in Neggio, Canton of Ticino, Switzerland, near Lugano. He bought a farm near the current location of Calle Murguiondo and Avenida Riestra. The lots were subdivided and with the sale of the first parcels, Villa Lugano was founded on 18 October 1908. The Villa Lugano station of the French-owned

Ferrocarril Compañía General en la Provincia de Buenos Aires Futbol Club Sonsonate is a Salvadoran professional football club based in Sonsonate, El Salvador. The club plays its home games at Estadio Anna Mercedes Campos, a stadium located in the City suburb of Sonsonate, Sonsonate, since 2009. The team ...

was inaugurated in 1910; about 40 families lived in Villa Lugano by 1912. The low-lying area, known originally as the ''Bañado de Flores'' ("Flores Wetlands") grew slowly until

flood control Flood control methods are used to reduce or prevent the detrimental effects of flood waters."Flood Control", MSN Encarta, 2008 (see below: Further reading). Flood relief methods are used to reduce the effects of flood waters or high water level ...

works were completed along the Cildañez Stream in the 1960s. It had developed a working class profile by then, and became the site of one of the city's largest ''

villa miseria A ''villa miseria'' (), or just ''villa'', is the informal term for a type of shanty town slum found in Argentina, mostly around the largest urban settlements. Name The term is a noun phrase made up of the Spanish words ''villa'' (''village'', '' ...

'' slums. Villa Lugano was chosen as the site of the General

Manuel Savio Manuel Nicolás Aristóbulo Savio (Buenos Aires, 15 March 1893 – Buenos Aires, 31 July 1948) was an Argentine engineer and military man, noted for his contribution to Argentine heavy industry in his roles as general manager of Fabricaciones ...

housing development. Built by the Municipal Housing Commission between 1970 and 1973, the complex was the largest public housing development built in Buenos Aires, including over 12,000 housing units and becoming home to nearly 30,000 people. Bordering

Villa Soldati Villa Soldati is a neighbourhood in Buenos Aires, Argentina, located in the South-West of the city. It has a population of approximately 41,000 people, 40% of which live in Barrio Soldati, a public housing development built between 1973 and 1979. ...

to the east, Villa Lugano was separated from the former by municipal edict in 1972. The district was connected to the

Buenos Aires Underground The Buenos Aires Underground ( es, Subterráneo de Buenos Aires, links=no), locally known as Subte (), is a rapid transit system that serves the area of the city of Buenos Aires, Argentina. The first section of this network (Plaza de Mayo–Pla ...

by the Pre-Metro, inaugurated in 1987.

Education

The neighbourhood counts with a number of educational institutions ranging from primary schools to universities and other terciary education institutions. Villa Lugano is home to the main Buenos Aires regional campus of the

National Technological University The National Technological University ( es, Universidad Tecnológica Nacional, UTN) is a country-wide national university in Argentina, and considered to be among the top engineering schools in the country. Hosting over 85,000 students, its stud ...

(UTN), Argentina's leading engineering-oriented university. Villa Lugano is also home to the

University of Buenos Aires The University of Buenos Aires ( es, Universidad de Buenos Aires, UBA) is a public research university in Buenos Aires, Argentina. Established in 1821, it is the premier institution of higher learning in the country and one of the most prestigi ...

-affiliated Escuela Técnica, a high school specializing in technical education and one of the university's five secondary education institutions.

Sports

Numerous sports institutions have their seat within Villa Lugano's borders, including the Club Social y Deportivo Yupanqui and the Club Atlético Lugano, both of which are known for their men's football teams in the

Primera D Metropolitana The Primera D is one of two leagues that form the fifth division of the Argentine football league system. Made up of 11 clubs from Buenos Aires Province, the league is the only one that remains amateur. The other league at level five is the Torneo ...

and constitute the "Lugano derby", although neither club's stadia are located in the neighbourhood itself.

Transport

Within the Greater Buenos Aires commuter rail network, Villa Lugano is served by the Lugano station of

Belgrano Sur Line The Belgrano Sur line is an Argentine commuter rail service in the Greater Buenos Aires area, currently operated by state-owned enterprise Trenes Argentinos. The Belgrano Sur runs over tracks and through stations built by the Franco–Belgian ...

. In addition, most of the

Premetro A premetro is a tramway or light railway which includes segments built to rapid transit standards, generally as part of a process of conversion to a metro-standards railway usually by the construction of tunnels in the central city area. Hist ...

line of the

runs through Villa Lugano, connecting the neighbourhood to the Underground network through Line E.

References

External links

*
Villa Lugano web site
{{coord, 34, 41, S, 58, 28, W, display=title, region:AR_type:city_source:GNS-enwiki Neighbourhoods of Buenos Aires