| Huaraz Waras |
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| — City — | |||
| Central plaza | |||
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| Motto: La muy noble y generosa ciudad | |||
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Huaraz
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| Coordinates: | |||
| Country | Peru | ||
| Region | Ancash | ||
| Province | Huaraz | ||
| Founded | 20 January 1574 | ||
| Government | |||
| • Type | Democracy | ||
| • Mayor | Vladimir Meza Altamirano. | ||
| Area | |||
| • Total | 370.03 km2 (142.9 sq mi) | ||
| Elevation | 3,052 m (10,013 ft) | ||
| Population (2007 calculation) | |||
| • Total | 120,000 | ||
| • Density | 324.3/km2 (839.9/sq mi) | ||
| Time zone | PET (UTC-5) | ||
| • Summer (DST) | PET (UTC-5) | ||
| Area code(s) | 43 | ||
| Website | www.munihuaraz.gob.pe | ||
Huaraz (Spanish pronunciation: [waˈɾaθ] or [waˈɾas]) is a city in Peru. It is the capital of the Departmento de Ancash (State of Ancash) and the seat of government of the Provincia de Huaraz (Province of Huaraz). The urban agglomerations population is distributed over the districts of Huaraz and Independencia. It was estimated in 2007 to exceed 120,000. Huaraz is headquarters of the province's Roman Catholic Bishop and the site of his official cathedral.
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Huaraz is in north-central Peru, about 420 km north of Lima, and at an altitude of 3,052 metres (10,013 ft). It is the largest population center in the agriculturally important Callejón de Huaylas valley. The Callejón (in Spanish roughly meaning large valley or corridor) is a north-south valley bounded on the east by the Cordillera Blanca (permanent white snowcaps and glaciers) and on the west by the Cordillera Negra (no permanent snowcapped peaks or glaciers, hence black). The Cordillera Blanca includes Huascarán, the highest mountain in Peru at 6,768 metres (22,205 ft) and the third highest in the Western Hemisphere. Huascarán and the adjacent peak Huandoy in fair weather are clearly visible from Huaraz.
The Rio Santa (Santa River) flows north through Huaraz. It is not commercially navigable but has always furnished the city with good water. The river is a rocky-bottom narrow stream of glacier-fed cold water that flows generally west of center in the Callejón, running north to the valley's north end. There it rushes downward through the narrow Canyon del Pato (Duck Canyon), turns westward at the town of Huallanca, and continues to the coast where it enters the Pacific Ocean south of the city of Chimbote. The Rio Santa is the traditional west boundary of Huaraz, although part of the city's population has lived on the west bank there for as long as two centuries.
The nominal north boundary of Huaraz is along a westward flowing creek that empties into the Rio Santa. The creek, whose watershed is the west face and foothills of the Cordillera Blanca, has twice since 1940 been the channel of two devastating earthquake-precipitated floods (see below).
The most recent devastating flood and avalanche along this creek bed was a result of the 1970 earthquake. The avalanche of 1941 had filled the creek valley with debris, covering the new suburb on the city's north edge. The 1970 avalanche and floodwaters down this creek valley destroyed the city's north-side subdivision, partially rebuilt in the late 1960s. Avalanche debris also created a temporary natural dam across the Rio Santa, which barrier caused flooding throughout much of the city. The quake had wrecked almost all the city's major buildings. Over the next few days the city was devastated by flooding from both the creek and the river and by water-borne earthquake debris.
Francisco Pizarro, known as the Spanish conquistador of Peru, in 1538 granted the right to collect taxes in the area within what is now the Province of Huaraz to his subordinate Sebastián de Torres. Alonso de Santoyo founded on 20 January 1574 an Hispanic Indigenous reduction (Reducción Hispano Indígena) with the name of Pampa Huarás de San Sebastián, with 14 quarters. Later it's political creation, dated on 12 February 1821, while General José de San Martín was staying in Huaura (city north from Lima) founded 4 Departments, including Huaylas as one of them, with its capital, the city of Caraz. Finally on 1857, it was split in two, giving birth to the new young Province of Huaraz with its capital, the nowadays, City of Huaraz.
From the beginning the Spaniards began exploiting the mineral wealth of the region. Several deposits of metal ores were discovered: silver, lead, and tin, among others. Availability of these metals for mining and smelting locally was the primary attraction of the Callejon area to Spain. Hundreds of the native Quechua-speakers by the 1570s were laboring in the mines.
As in other areas of Spanish settlement in the Andean countries most agricultural works such as native irrigation canals and terraces were appropriated or destroyed by the colonial administrators. The Spaniards did not call their tactics slavery, though in fact the effects were the same. Disappearances and unexplained deaths were common for resistors. The entire population of some villages was forcibly marched long distances and resettled. To identify those who tried to return to their prior homes, the native peoples were required to wear distinctive clothing identifiable by areas or provinces. The Spanish patron or hacendado often chose for those people under his control a costume copied from his home region in Spain. These costumes are now a source of regional and national pride among many Andeans who identify with their native ancestry.
Much of the north side and a large part of the center of the city was destroyed in 1941 by floodwaters and avalanche debris because of a burst reservoir that was the city's municipal water supply. The reservoir dam was about 6 km (3.7 mi) east of the town and more than 200 meters elevation above it. The dam failed because of sudden overflow pressure from an avalanche of glacier ice probably caused by a localized tremor (earthquake). Within a few minutes the stream bed was filled with an avalanche of water, mud, boulders, and associated debris whose crest by the time it reached the city may have exceeded 15 meters height above the stream bed. In as few as four minutes after the dam burst the avalanche obliterated and covered the city's most modern suburb and destroyed most of the north half of the city.
After the 1941 disaster the old reservoir dam was repaired but not replaced. Doubts about the safety of the dam were largely responsible for abandonment of that area for redevelopment. The creek valley upstream from the city in the mid-1960s exhibited scarred inner banks several meters higher than the normal water level. The scarring caused by the avalanche was increasingly higher above the stream bed on the creek valley walls nearer the reservoir. The scoured appearance of the creek valley indicated the mass and power of the avalanche gaining momentum as it crashed down the narrow valley, accumulating debris as it descended.
By 1965 fewer than a half dozen buildings had been rebuilt in the creek valley adjacent north of the city. The valley was still filled by as many as three meters of soil and debris deposited by the 1941 avalanche. Giant boulders lay about, some protruding as many as four meters above the 1965 creek bed level. Many boulders from the 1941 avalanche were strewn down to the confluence of the creek with the Rio Santa. Huaraz area residents who remembered the disaster of 1941 said in 1965 that the river itself was diverted by avalanche debris for some days until eroded away and carried downstream (northward), and there were boulders on the west bank that had come with the avalanche.
On 31 May 1970 the same reservoir dam burst during the Ancash earthquake. Down the creek valley again came an avalanche eerily similar to that of 1941. In the prior four years or so the suburb had begun to again be redeveloped: numerous residences were built atop the 1941 avalanche deposit within the at-risk creek valley. The earthquake was 7.8 on the Richter scale. Within its duration of 45 seconds virtually every structure of consequence in the city's center was destroyed. A few minutes later the north half of the city, particularly in the creek valley, was obliterated by an avalanche of icy mud carrying boulders and other debris.
As many as 20,000 people were killed within the city; there were reported only 91 survivors within the city itself. The historic structures along the narrow streets, particularly the big adobe casonas (large houses) roofed with ceramic tiles, were reduced to rubble. The main square was evident by the dearth of rubble; the city was rebuilt around it. Where once stood the old casonas and their high-walled compounds now there are smaller buildings. The narrow streets had been deathtraps during the quake; the post-1970 city design has wider, more modern streets.
Huaraz is connected to the Pacific coast by three highways. One goes generally westward, another goes south then west, and the other goes north then west. All three roads go from the Andes down into the desert coastal region.
The westward route rises into the Cordillera Negra, crests at about 4000 m (ca. 13,100 ft), then winds downward in altitude to the coastal city of Casma on the Pan American Highway. (Casma is the largest population center between the cities of Lima and Chimbote.)
The southward route from Huaraz goes about 40 km toward the town of Recuay, where it turns west. It rises to about 4300 m (ca. 14,000 ft) where it crests the south part of the Cordillera Negra. From there the narrow winding highway in a distance of about 80 km (ca. 60 miles) descends to the town of Huarmey (south of Casma) on the coast. Here it connects with the Pan American Highway (187 km north of Lima).
The northward route going north from Huaraz follows the Rio Santa to the north end of the Callejon de Huaylas, where it branches into two. The minor branch goes steeply westward up to the ancient town of Huaylas and then northwestward down to the coast. The main highway goes north beside the Canyon del Pato through a dozen one-lane tunnels, precipitously descends several thousand meters by switch-backs and hairpin curves on the one-lane rocky roadway, and arrives at the town of Huallanca. Here there is a connection with the Santa Railway. The highway again splits. The most heavily traveled fork continues generally west to the coastal city of Chimbote where it connects with the Pan American Highway. The other fork goes from Huallanca northward and upward into the northern Peruvian Andes.
Travel by vehicle via any of the three highway routes from Huaraz to the coast generally requires seven to eight hours to either Lima or Chimbote. Less than 45 minutes drive north from Huaraz lies the small Anta airport; the airfield serves small planes from the two largest mining companies in the region as well as small commercial prop-driven aircraft of the regional airline LC Busre.
The peaks of the region have for many decades have been the testing grounds for mountain climbers anticipating future expeditions into the Himalayas. Huaraz is a popular base for expeditions into the Cordillera Blanca and the Huayhuash south of the Callejon del Huaylas.
Huascarán National Park is a popular destination for tourists.
In the streets surrounding the farmers' market, the paraditas (street markets) of local sellers offer craft products such as ponchos, alpaca textiles (carpets, sweaters, etc.); jewelry made of locally-mined tin, copper, and silver; cuarteados (a typical dessert from the nearby town of Caraz made by mixing manjarblanco and fruit cake); boxes of manjarblanco, butter, cheese, honey, smoked and salty hams, jerky (Quechua charqui), etc.
Huaraz is known as the 'Switzerland of the South' because of its beautiful peaks that are visible from the city centre.
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