Nuñoa

Ñuñoa (from Mapudungun: ñuñowe 'place of ñuños') is a commune located in the northeastern sector of the city of Santiago, capital of Chile. Its limits are: to the north and west with Providencia, to the south with Macul, to the west with Santiago, to the southeast with San Joaquín, to the southeast with Peñalolén and to the east with La Reina. The streets that limit it are Malaquías Concha street to the north, Diagonal Oriente and av. Eliecer Parada, to the south Rodrigo de Araya, to the east Avenida Ossa/Américo Vespucio and to the west Av. Vicuña Mackenna. It has an area of 16.9 km² and according to the 2002 census it had 163,511 inhabitants, while according to the 2017 census there are 208,237 inhabitants, increasing by 27.3% in fifteen years.

The commune is recognized for being one of the communes with the highest quality of life in Santiago, it is also classified as one of the safest in Chile and its human development index is one of the highest in the country.

Ñuñoa is home to the largest number of professionals with university studies in Chile (18.11% of the total number of professionals in the country) and is made up of medium and upper-middle socioeconomic groups.

History

For the first settlements see Pre-Hispanic settlements in Santiago de Chile, Early Agribusiness Period and Promaucaes.

For a review of the colonial lands of Ñuñoa see Ñuñoa colonial farms.

Origin

Original cartel of the old Ñuñoa station, of State Railways, which is preserved in the Railway Museum of Santiago.

The Indian town of Ñuñohue was so called because it was located in the center of the region of the same name, in what is now Plaza Ñuñoa. The cacique of this town was Longomavico or Aponchonique, and the subordinate caciques Malti and Tocalevi, who were his brothers, depended on him. Pedro de Valdivia distributed among his main companions the indigenous ranches in the territory that they generically called Ñuñoa.

Comiendas were then established in the ranches of Apokintu, Butacura, Macul, Ñuñoa and Tobalahue. Those of Macul and Ñuñoa were granted to Juan Jofré, and later passed on to his son Luis. Already in the XVII century, the town of Ñuñoa did not exist as an indigenous town and the encomienda was extinct. The beauty of the Ñuñoína lands, their fertility and the irrigation that the indigenous people had introduced in many of their sectors, attracted the attention of the conquerors from the first moments. Around 1546, relatively small plots of land began to be distributed through concessions also called farms (from Quechua: chakra 'parcela').

The roads began to form naturally from the very moment the distribution of the land began. The most important and category during the XVIII century was the Camino de Ñuñohue that started to the east from La Ollería street (today, Portugal avenue), to locate its initial section in what is now 10 de Julio Huamachuco avenue and then continue along current Irarrázaval avenue. At the end of the XIX century, the one already called Camino de Ñuñoa, which had moved its starting point to the east of the Cintura Oriente (what is currently known as Vicuña Mackenna avenue), it is renamed avenue and later it receives the name of Irarrázaval avenue in homage to Manuel José Yrarrázaval Larraín, author of the law on the Autonomous Commune and signatory of the decree that created the commune of Ñuñoa.

19th century

The Decree of December 22, 1891, in its article 1, created the Municipality of Ñuñoa with the rural sub-delegations 1st Las Condes, 2nd San Carlos, 3rd Apoquindo, 4th Ñuñoa, 5th La Providencia, 6th Santa Rosa, 7th Subercaseaux and 26th Mineral de Las Condes in the Department of Santiago, that is, with a territory much larger than the current one. On May 6, 1894, by Presidential Decree, the commune of Ñuñoa was created, which in those years had 1,197 inhabitants, and had four schools, post office, Civil Registry, and butcher shops. Its first mayor was, just in 1894, Alejandro Chadwick. Three years later, on February 25, 1897, within the territory of Ñuñoa, the municipality of Providencia was established with subdelegations 5a, La Providencia; 1a, Las Condes; 2a, San Carlos and 26a, Mineral de Las Condes, in an urbanization process whose features, in the opinion of León Echaiz, "now come from the city of Santiago that advances towards its fields".

On August 10, 1893, the Municipality of San Miguel was created, segregating subdelegations 6a, Santa Rosa and 7a, Subercaseaux. In this way, the Municipality of Ñuñoa was made up of the rural subdelegations 4a, Ñuñoa and 3a Tobalaba (3a, Apoquindo), occupying approximately the area that includes the current communes of Ñuñoa, La Reina, Macul and Peñalolén.

Francisco Solano Asta-Buruaga y Cienfuegos wrote in 1899 in his Geographical Dictionary of the Republic of Chile where he described it as a 'hamlet':

Ñuñoa.-—Caserío contiguo o barrio de la ciudad de Santiago, located at its extreme southeast, and whose center is an old parish church four kilometers away from the main square of the precited city. It consists of a population of 460 inhabitants consisting of beautiful fifths and possessions of cultivated places, and has free schools, civil registration and post offices and industrial establishments. It is also a municipal seat, whose territory includes the sub-delegations of the department of Santiago, called Apoquindo, Las Condes, Mineral de las Condes, Ñuñoa, Providencia, San Carlos (canal de), Santa Rosa and Subercasseaux.

20th century

Group of schools in the Ñuñoa square (1902).

Chilean geographer Luis Risopatrón describes Ñuñoa as a 'lugarejo' in his book Diccionario Jeográfico de Chile in 1924:

Ñuñoa (Lugarejo) 33° 28’ 70° 36’. It has mail service, civil rejistro and public schools and has formed at 600 m of altitude, in the middle of beautiful fifths and possessions of cultivated places, it has made the E side of the city of Santiago, of which it forms a neighborhood; in a year of observations it has scored 783,7 mm for the fallen water.

DFL No. 8583 of December 30, 1927, suppresses the Municipality of La Florida (subdelegation 15a, Lo Cañas) from the Department of La Victoria and annexes it to Ñuñoa. Thus, the new commune-subdelegation of Ñuñoa includes the old subdelegations: 3rd, Tobalaba, and 4th, Ñuñoa, the part of the old subdelegation 5th, Providencia, located to the south of Caupolicán and Pizarro streets and the imaginary straight line that joins them, from the department of Santiago and subdelegation 15, Lo Cañas, from the old department of La Victoria.

In 1934 the commune-subdelegation of La Florida was reestablished, separating it from Ñuñoa.

In February 1963 by Law 15,169, the commune-subdelegation of La Reina was created with the upper part of the commune and, finally, on March 18, 1981, the communal limits were modified, creating the communes of Macul and Peñalolén, the current commune of Ñuñoa being definitively established.

During the military dictatorship, the National Stadium, located in the commune and the country's main sports center, became an important detention center for the regime of Augusto Pinochet Ugarte. This historical character of the National Stadium used as a detention center is portrayed in films such as Missing, by Costa Gavras, and makes it a well-known site of memory.

Ñuñoa witnessed great changes during the 20th century. It went from housing a large part of the Santiago upper class until the mid-70's (this socioeconomic segment was migrating to the peripheral end of this same northeastern sector of the capital); to become a fundamentally middle-class commune, although it is still recognized as a place with excellent living conditions.

21st century

In recent years, the commune has experienced a huge real estate boom, as a result of its good quality of life and its proximity to the center of Santiago, resulting in an increase in the price of homes in the area. The inauguration of Line 3 of the Santiago Metro in 2019, which runs through the entire Avenida Irarrázaval, has been a great incentive for the continuation of the real estate and commercial development of the commune, improving connectivity with the rest of the city. Product of these changes in the communal infrastructure, there has also been a significant demographic increase, going from 163,511 inhabitants in 2002 to 208,237 inhabitants in 2017, increasing by 27.3% in fifteen years, and with an estimate of more than 250,000 inhabitants for the year 2022.

Panoramic view of Ñuñoa where real estate development is observed in the winter of 2011.

Its reputation as a professional middle-class commune has mutated as the population renews and the cost of living in it rises. From a political point of view, the change has been reflected in the year 2021, both the left-wing vote in the municipal election (where the National Renovation party had won since 1996) and in the first and second presidential rounds of 2021, in which the commune of Ñuñoa was the commune with the second highest percentage of votes where the candidate of the Approve Dignity coalition prevailed Gabriel Boric. He was also part of one of the eight communes in the country where the "I approve" option won in the 2022 constitutional plebiscite. The formation of new middle-class and upper-class groups that live in this sector of the capital to develop a cosmopolitan, urban lifestyle and more integrated with other social groups has turned into a degeneration of the demonym by becoming the term ñuñoismo or ñuñoinos, used in an pejorative to refer to the progressive lifestyle that, it is assumed, is based on the youngest inhabitants of this commune.

Political administration

Mayor Emilia Rios Saavedra elected for the period 2021-2024.

Municipality of Ñuñoa.

Municipality

The Illustrious Municipality of Ñuñoa is directed by the mayoress Emilia Ríos Saavedra (RD) and ten councilors:

I approve of Dignity

• Alejandra Valle Salinas (Ind./COM)
• Veronica Chávez Gutiérrez (CS)
• Mirella Del Rio Barañao (PCCh)
• Camilo Brodsky Bertoni (PCCh)

Democratic Socialism

• Maite Descouvieres Vargas (PS)

Chile Come on

• Germán Sylvester Frias (RN)
• Daniela Bonvallet Setti (Ind./RN)
• Julio Martínez Colina (UDI)

Out of Coalition

• Deborah Carvallo Contreras (PEV)
• María Eugenia Lorenzini (Ind.)

Parliamentary representation

Ñuñoa belongs to the 10th Electoral District and the 7th Senatorial District (Metropolitan Region). It is represented in the Chamber of Deputies by the deputies Gonzalo Winter (CS), Lorena Fries (CS), Emilia Schneider (CS), Alejandra Placencia (PCCh), Helia Molina (PPD), Jorge Alessandri Vergara (UDI), María Luisa Cordero (Ind-RN) and Johannes Kaiser (PLR) in the period 2022-2026. In turn, the Senate is represented by Fabiola Campillai Rojas (Ind), Claudia Pascual (PCCh), Luciano Cruz Coke (EVOP), Manuel José Ossandon (RN) and Rojo Edwards (PLR) in the period 2022-2030.

Economy

In 2018, the number of companies registered in Ñuñoa was 12,990. The Economic Complexity Index (ECI) in the same year was 2.8, while the economic activities with the highest Revealed Comparative Advantage (RCA) index were Photographic Developing, Printing and Enlarging Services (24.19), Manufacturing Ovens, Hearths and Burners (22.01) and Banquet, Wedding and Other Celebrations Services (19.56).

Transportation

Mesanina de la station Chile-Spain del Metro de Santiago.

Ñuñoa has 16 Santiago Metro stations corresponding to 4 lines, having the second largest station coverage after Santiago Centro. A new line is in planning which will be operational by the year 2030:

: Irarrázaval, Monseñor Eyzaguirre, Ñuñoa, Chile Spain, Villa Frei and Plaza Egaña.

: Prince of Wales, Simon Bolivar, Plaza Egaña, Los Orientales and Greece.

: Irarrázaval and Ñuble

: Ñuble, Estadio Nacional y Ñuñoa.

(temptary names): Diagonal East, Chile, Greece and Rodrigo de Araya.

Next to the communes of La Reina, Peñalolén and Macul, it was inserted in the Transantiago feeder Zone D.

Culture

National Stadium during a Chilean Soccer Selection game in 2006

Mosque As-Salam

Greek Orthodox Church of the Saints of Constantine and Elena

Ñuñoa was chosen in 2007, for the third consecutive year, as the commune of Santiago de Chile with the highest quality of life standard, thanks to its large number of green and sports areas, as well as various cultural centers. Its streets abound with flowering plants and trees such as lilacs, bougainvilleas, jacarandas, almond and cherry trees, its wide sidewalks and avenues, diverse residential architecture and a valuable heritage contribution to the city of Santiago.

This commune, the oldest in the eastern sector of Santiago, has managed to assimilate all the benefits of the big city (subway, banks, shopping centers, etc.), without sacrificing its traditional and residential character.

Ñuñoa has university campuses of national importance such as the Juan Gómez Millas Campus of the University of Chile, the traditional Pedagogical Campus, today the Metropolitan University of Educational Sciences, and a campus that houses the faculty Engineering from the Metropolitan Technological University (UTEM). The Ñuñoa Book Fair and the Chilean Festival are held annually in the commune during the National Holidays.

The commune houses, as part of its religious pluralism, the As-Salam Mosque, the only one in Santiago; a Greek Catholic-Orthodox church, a Russian Orthodox church and numerous Evangelical and Catholic churches, such as the Sanctuary-Parish of Santa Gema Galgani. It also houses the Archiepiscopal Residence of Santiago and the Women's Grand Lodge.

The municipality received, in the name of the city of Santiago, one of the venues for the 1962 Soccer World Cup: in the National Stadium. This sports venue is the largest in the country, and is leased both to play various soccer matches and for large musical events.

Among its public places are Plaza Ñuñoa and the interesting nightlife that it houses, with numerous pubs and restaurants; the Theater of the Catholic University; the La Batuta nightlife venue, where some of the country's most important bands and soloists have made their debut (along with hosting foreign artists); the castle of Count Pedro Torres that houses the Manuel de Salas Experimental High School; the House of Culture and its Gabriela Mistral Library.

Classics of the most bohemian area of Ñuñoa are Las Lanzas, El Dante and La Fuente Suiza, all of them with a local gastronomic tradition of many years.

The commune has two police stations of Carabineros de Chile: the 18th Police Station of Ñuñoa, located at Licenciado de las Peñas N° 5147, and the 33rd Police Station of Ñuñoa, at Guillermo Mann N° 2100, in addition to the Police Section. Traffic Accident Investigation located at Avenida Pedro de Valdivia No. 4795.

This is one of the communes with the most commerce in Santiago, supermarkets and outlets are the ones that occupy the most space in this commune. Irarrázaval avenue is known for being the center of a large number of outlets of well-known brands and traditional commerce such as snails, Los Carros stalls. In Ñuñoa there is also a larger-scale shopping center: Mall Portal Ñuñoa belonging to the Cencosud group.

Since 2021, in popular culture, the degeneration of the name of the inhabitant of the commune in a caricatural way, in which they are called Ñuñoinos young people who feel identified with progressive policies but are part of a wealthy economic status, particularly those who feel identified with parties that make up the Broad Front conglomerate or that, failing that, from the 2021 elections that have given their fervent support to the governing coalition of Approve Dignity, in which President Gabriel Boric obtained the second majority percentage of votes in the second round with 59.57% in the 2021 presidential elections as well as in the Constitutional Exit Plebiscite of 2022 in which the commune of Ñuñoa was part of the 8 communes in which the "I Approve" option won with 50.41% of the preferences.

Education

Private Schools:

• Swiss College of Santiago
• Kendal English School
• Akros College
• Manuel de Salas Experimental Liceo
• Colegio La Cantera
• Colegio San Agustín
• Colegio Manquevcura
• Colegio Universitario el Salvador
• Colegio Calasanz
• Colegio Instituto Santa Maria
• Colegio Francisco Encina

Public Schools:

• Liceo Augusto D'Halmar
• Liceous Republic of Syria
• Colegio República de Costa Rica
• Liceo Lenka Franulic
• Liceo Carmela Silva Donoso

Sectors

List of neighborhoods

Typical areas

There are also traditional neighborhoods and historical preservation currently defined by the commune:

• Public Employees and Journalists Chile-Spain
• Olympic Villa in Santiago
• Empart de Ñuñoa
• Barrio Elías de la Cruz
• Barrio Suárez Mujica
• Staff population for the Cavalry School
• Villa Presidente Frei

Central area

Environment of the Ñuñoa Square at night.

Represents the interior sector of the commune, in the most commercial environment of Irarrázaval avenue approximately between Pedro Torres and Campo de Deportes. It has neighborhoods such as Plaza Ñuñoa and Villaseca, as well as Simón Bolívar and Eduardo Castillo Velasco avenues. It has had an important real estate development of tall buildings in recent decades, which has increased the population and commercial activity.

The Plaza Ñuñoa sector is the most characteristic of the commune, it is the civic center and where its main cultural and recreational events take place. The current importance of the neighborhood that surrounds and includes the square, has been established since the late 60s with the densification of the adjoining urbanization, and the appearance of cultural spaces such as the "Dante" (current "UC Theater") that was interconnected with the emerging densification of the Plaza Egaña neighborhood. Since the 90's an accelerated transformation of the area begins, in which its offer becomes more varied and with this it is placed among the great bohemian neighborhoods of Chile, with bars and restaurants such as La Batuta, Las Lanzas, El Dante, La Fuente Suiza, La Tecla and the HBH Brewery, or the Boulevard Plaza Ñuñoa.

The arrival of the Santiago Metro and the inauguration of the Chile-España Station on line 3, and the Ñuñoa Station combined with line 6, have allowed it to give new residential and commercial impetus to the area.

Northeast Sector

Entrance to the Pucará Botanic Park.

Environment of Plaza Egaña in March 2021

This sector of the commune is characterized by being mainly upper-middle class residential, where houses and low-rise buildings predominate. It borders La Reina to the east and Providencia to the northeast. It has neighborhoods like; Botanical Park, Pucará, Montenegro, Amapolas, Los Adoquines, Plaza Egaña and Los Guindos, as well as the Arturo Prat town.

The Plaza Egaña neighborhood connects the commune of La Reina with Ñuñoa and its main artery is Avenida Ossa (or Américo Vespucio). It is a residential area with a commercial pole that has developed with the arrival of the Santiago Metro in 2005, the tender for Vespucio Oriente, and the construction of the Plaza Egaña Mall, as well as trade in existing traditional services.

Egaña Square was part of an old sector of Ñuñoa called Los Guindos. This sector included a part called Antigua Villa de Los Guindos and three annexed populations called New Population of Los Guindos, German Population of Los Guindos and Oriental Population of Los Guindos. The Antigua Villa de Los Guindos and its annexed towns were born and evolved independently of the town or commune of Ñuñoa (both towns had different telephone codes, for example). The Los Guindos sector was later fully absorbed by the Ñuñoa commune (partly due to the construction of Diagonal Oriente street that divided it in two). His memory is preserved today only in the Plaza de Los Guindos (location of the 18th Ñuñoa Police Station), some local street names, the 3rd Ñuñoa Fire Company and a monolith of the Los Guindos Lions Club in the intersection of Alcalde Monckeberg street and Irarrázaval avenue. The square itself in this sector functioned for many decades as the seat of the penultimate station of the Blood Railroad and then Eléctrico de Ñuñoa (whose last station was located on Ossa avenue with the current Príncipe de Gales avenue).

The rest of the neighborhoods in the sector are mainly low-density house-garden dwellings, where there is a high quality of neighborhood life, with the exception of the Arturo Prat population, located between Emilia Tellez and Pucará, which is currently a renovation zone urban.

Southeast Sector

Torres de la Villa Frei.

It is a predominantly middle-class sector where there are elaborately designed housing complexes built in the mid-XX century. Neighborhoods such as Villa Frei, Juan XXIII Park, the Milcavi neighborhood, and the villas Los Presidentes, Lo Plaza, Los Jardines and Los Alerces stand out. It borders with Peñalolén to the east and with Macul to the south.

The Villa Frei sector is located between Ramón Cruz Montt, Mayor Jorge Monckeberg, and Irarrázaval and Grecia avenues. It has numerous squares, including the Ramón Cruz Park, which contains exercise machines, games for children and a court. It is also located a few steps from the Villa Frei subway on subway line 3, and there are multiple fast food outlets and various themes. It was built in the mid-1960's by then President Eduardo Frei Montalva. It is made up of 3,699 homes on a 40-hectare plot, which includes 2 hectares of public space and green areas.

Juan XXIII Park was designed in the 1960s by the well-known architect, landscape architect and filmmaker Alvaro Covácevich, who used it as a location for the final scene of his film “Morir un poco” (1966). It has also been the scene of thousands of children's games and activities, family walks and spring picnics because its large space and vegetation offer many possibilities for recreation for both neighbors and occasional visitors.

Western sector

Sector south of the Italian Quarter, shared neighborhood with the commune of Providencia

The western sector of the commune mixes traditional and commercial neighborhoods and a boom in tall buildings. It adjoins central Santiago to the west and Providencia to the north, a commune with which it shares the southern part of neighborhoods such as Barrio Italia and Parque Bustamante. There are also neighborhoods like; Plaza San Esteban, Javiera Carrera, Eusebio Lillo, Plaza Sucre and Guillermo Franke.

Caupolicán street is in charge of dividing both Ñuñoa de Providencia in Barrio Italia. It is an old residential area that in recent times has been transformed into a pole of design activities, furniture sales, interior decoration and clothing, creating an important dynamism in these areas, in the style of the Palermo neighborhood of Buenos Aires..

The Colo-Colo neighborhood is located along Salvador, Irarrázaval and Sucre avenues, around Colo Colo street. It is a residential sector, with green areas and characteristic oriental plane trees, which in autumn cover these avenues with leaves. Commercially, it retains family bakeries and stores. Similar to the Guillermo Franke neighborhood, sectors with a high quality of life with vegetation, cafes and friendly commerce.

Southwestern sector

Surponsive sector of Ñuñoa, where are the Olympic Villa and the National Stadium

It includes the area of the commune in the surroundings of the National Stadium, bordering Santiago to the west, San Joaquín to the south-west and Macul to the south. It is made up mainly of middle and lower-middle class homes.

Residential sectors located in the axis of José Pedro Alessandri avenue and in the first blocks to the north of Grecia avenue coexist, together with villas created mainly between the 60s and 70s and most of which were successfully adapted to the complex of the commune, limits to the west with Vicuña Mackenna avenue and to the north with Eduardo Castillo Velasco street. This neighborhood suffered post-earthquake effects that affected several villas, leaving a large percentage uninhabitable. Today homeowners battle insurance and the municipality to get financial support for major structural modifications.

The Suarez Mujica neighborhood located between Av. Grecia, Lo Encalada, Carlos Dittborn and av. Marathon, is an emblematic residential sector of the commune that is adjacent to the National Stadium. Avenida Grecia counts as the main artery of the sector, which preserves a residential character similar to other sectors of the commune, but adjacent to the surroundings of the National Stadium.

Featured Characters

• Maria Mohor, painter and sculptor.
• Myriam Hernández, popular singer from the 80s to the present.
• José Luis Rosasco, writer and politician.
• José Santos González Vera, writer, Premio Nacional de Literatura, 1950.
• Claudio Narea, musician and guitarist of Los Prisioneros.
• Francisco Completed, former Minister of Justice.
• José Santos León, Chilean rider.
• Jaime Hales, ex-concejal of the commune, astrologer, writer.
• Manuel Bustos, politician.
• Nemesio Antunez, Chilean painter.
• Jorge Jiménez de la Jara, an academic in the public health department.
• Gerardo Parra, magician.
• Andrés Zarhi, news anchor, Ñuñoa mayor.
• Alejandro Lipschutz, scientist and academic, National Science Prize, 1969.
• Daniela Vega, Actress and activist for LGBTIQ+ rights, Ñuñoa's illustrious daughter, 2022.

References and footnotes