ZAMORA´S URBAN STRUCTURE

Cities are places where large amounts of people and their activities are concentrated.
The city we are going to analyze is in Castile and León, Spain. It is located near the frontier with Portugal and crossed by the Duero river. Where a prehistorical settlement was established.

The city plan shows an irregular layout , which time ago was all surrounded by a large stone wall. In addition, combined with the castle and it´s deep ditch, provided Zamora the name of "la bien cercada" because in ancient times protected Zamora´s inhabitants of invations. Actually, the wall suffered some improvements and ampliations due to the continuous increasing number of population.
The main historic buildings that keeps in, are the cathedral,  the Condes de Alba y Aliste palace , and some other churches. Although, some parisis did not have enough space inside, so they decided to go outskirts. Sadly only 3km of the wall have survived to the years.
Nowadays, the main urban functions of the historic center are cultural and residential. Some of the problems that affect the historic center are the shortage of public transport , the appearance of abbandoned houses, and ageing population. As a result some possible solutions are making wider streets to let pulic transport arrive to it, and also makin more more economic the lands otherwise the abbandoned houses will never be restored and converted in homes.


 The pattern of the expansion zone is irregual, the city was divided by three main streets Santa Clara, San Torcuarto and Balborraz. After that, some of the most representative transformations of this period can be found in the appearance of the flour bussines (Harinas Bobo)(industrial), important and beautiful bourgeois´ houses that provide a great eye enjoyment (residential), Mercado de Abastos (comercial), the construction of the train staition and also some ludic buildings as the Casino.
Despite all these changes, the main urban fuction of the área continue been residential.
Some of the problems which affect this part of the city are traffic in peak hours, building restoration, lack of services and the necesity of a better conditions public transport. However,  some possible solutions are the investment of money and some law changes to reduce traffic.



 The outskirts of the city include the residential areas created to cover the demand of the rural exodus that took place in the 1960s-70s, such as Los Bloques or San José Obrero . In addition, Zamora has residential areas created in the 80s following the Garden City model which are  located next to the hospital, in the wesrtern part of the city. Also we have some residential áreas recently crated in the Zamora´s alfoz, like Siglo XXI, or the one located in Morales del Vino. All of them following a regular pattern.
There are also industrial and business áreas including La Hiniesta and Los Llanos Industrial paks, Vistalegre or Valderaduey  situated all around Zamora. Furthermore, some Zamora´s services are Corazón de María school, Virgen de la Concha, Provincial Hospital and Recoletas  hospitals. Moreover, The main transportation networks found in this area are Autovía A-66, Nacional N-630 and Nacional N-122, apart from the Ave rails.
Some of the problems affecting the outskirts of the city are a lack of a good public transport and too much distance to the city center. However,  some possible solutions are the investment of money in public transport.