Lagoa, Azores


Lagoa is a municipality in the southwestern part of São Miguel Island in the Azores. The population in 2011 was 14,442, in an area of 45.59 km². Lagoa is located east of Ponta Delgada, the island capital.

History

The area of Lagoa was settled just after the first colonists came to the island of São Miguel, and its first inhabitants established their homes in the areas that would eventually form the villages of Lagoa and Água de Pau. It is believed that early settlers chose the area for its sheltered bay, which was necessary for their loading and unloading of cargo, livestock and provisions. The Porto dos Carneiros was one of these areas, so named for the fact that sheep, as well as other animals, were offloaded within its cove. The celebrated Portuguese historian, Father Gaspar Frutuoso referred to Lagoa, in the way that the first settlers named it, a name that was dependent on where they made their homes:
It was in the area of the Church of Santa Cruz that most of these original founders established their homes, near an ancient lake. In the 15th Century, the island of São Miguel continued to receive settlers and in Lagoa those colonists steadily settled farther to the west, around the bay that became known as Porto dos Carneiros, where fishing began to take on an important aspect of the local economy. To the east of the village of Lagoa, several families established agrarian settlements in the vicinity of Água de Pau.
Around 1515, due to its social and economic growth the village of Água de Pau was elevated to Villa and made temporary municipal seat of the newly incorporated municipality of Lagoa. By this time, the historian Father Gaspar Frutuoso noted in his tome Saudades da Terra the 100 homes existed in the community; a comparable size to the other centers on the island, but only half the size of Ponta Delgada, Vila Franca do Campo or Ribeira Grande. In 1522 Lagoa, the village, became the municipal seat of the municipality, at a time when the population hovered around 1000 people and 300 homes. At the time, it was considered one of the more productive agricultural areas of the island, responsible for wheat, wine and woad production. Its port was the important regional point of entry and exit for many of its products, in addition to fishing center.
The communities prosperity extended into the 19th century, when the village was the center of a flourishing ceramic industry and distillation of alcohol and spirits. By the 20th Century these industries were supplemented by factories for the production of vegetable oil, soap and animal feeds, at a time when agricultural production and the fishery was also dominant. At the end of the 20th Century, the tertiary sector had taken on a significant part of the areas economy, while the number of new companies involved in the sector grew.

Geography

Physical geography

The municipality is located on the southern coast of São Miguel, and nestled between the three larger municipalities of Ponta Delgada, Ribeira Grande and Vila Franca do Campo ; its municipal seat is approximately nine kilometers from the principal city on the island. It was created on April 11, 1522 by royal decree from King D. João III, and although the municipal seat was temporarily assigned to Água de Pau, it is currently occupied by the urbanized core of Nossa Senhora do Rosário and Santa Cruz.
Its small territory is relatively rich in biodiversity, influenced by its differentiated environmental characteristics between the Fogo volcano and the volcanic complex of Picos. Most of this space is occupied by pasturelands, cultivated tracts and, along the coast, an urbanized core. The cryptomeria, acacia and eucalyptus are just some of the variety of trees that populate the forests in the interior, while along the southern flank of Fogo, there are many endemic species of Erica azorica, Calluna vulgaris, the cedro-do-mato the pau branco.

Ecoregions & protected areas

The climate is, like much of the archipelago, temperate and maritime; the mean annual temperature is about, February being the coldest month ) and August the warmest. The mean annual humidity is approximately 83%.

Human geography

The population consists of 7010 men and 7010 women, of whom 43.9% are between 0–25 years of age, while 1288 are 65 years or greater. This population has seen a constant increase, beginning at the end of the 1920s, until today. This was briefly interrupted at the end of the 1960s, with a wave of emigration to the United States and Canada. Before this period, the 10.2% decrease in the population was attributed to the participation of many youth in the Portuguese contingent in World War I, and the post-war epidemic that developed. In the 1980s, the population has slowly rebounded, while growth has marked in the 1990s, with 9.5% increase in population.
Since 1950, Lagoa has been constantly evolving, and in 2001 the residential area encompassed 4385 homes, that included many of the older heritage dwellings that have survived since colonization. Between 1991 and 2001, there was a 36% growth in the number of occupied dwellings in the urbanized core, while the communities of Água de Pau and Santa Cruz have also grown markedly. Administratively, five parishes comprise the municipality of Lagoa, with two specifically part of the urbanized core of the village ; they are:
Lagoa is twinned with:
The 2001 Portuguese census identified a population of 5575 residents active in the workforce; 42.7% are employed: 85.5% as workers and 5% owners/proprietors, while the remainder pertain to unclassified classes, homemakers or active members of the local cooperative. The census further concludes that 848 companies have headquarters in the municipality, equivalent to 4.8% of the Azores, and showing a 26.4% increase between 2001 and 2004. These companies are primarily construction firms, but also include gross and domestic retail, repair, although agriculture is the primary economic beneficiary. Between 2001 and 2004, activities in agricultural production, livestock, hunting and forestry have seen a 48.4% growth between 2001 and 2004.
The tertiary sector is the primary employer in the municipality; 58.5% of the population identify themselves as public servants, accounting for a 17.8% growth, while hotelier and restaurants show a 44.2% growth during the same period. Recently, Lagoa has developed a tourist infrastructure associated in character with its historic past, but primarily its resort centers, bays, coves and beaches, traditional farms and older buildings have attracted new visitors. Hotels and associated bed & breakfast-type residencias are common, with the 4-star Caloura Hotel Resort the primary tourist destination.

Tourism

The municipality of Lagoa has many recognized natural environments and areas popular with tourists to the island of São Miguel. Its tourist ex-libris is the small resort hamlet of Caloura, nestled along the southern coast and separated from the neighboring community of Água de Alto. Although it does not include a beach, the sheltered coves and volcanic rock bays are popular with locals and tourists for the clear blue-green waters, a natural pool and fisherman's port, as well as a bar and esplanade. The area benefits from a favourable microclimate, that offers visitors the opportunity to swim in the transparent waters of its port which has earned the area a Blue Flag designation. Throughout the year there are diverse cultural events, the most relevant is the Festa do Pescador, in addition to folklore festivals and nautical themed events, that attract local residents to the village. Access to Caloura is made by an ancillary connection to the regional road in Água de Pau.
In Água de Pau, from Pico da Figueira, the Monte Santo Outlook is popular with tourists for the panoramas of the municipality, and further above, along the Regional Road between Água de Pau and Ribeira Chã, the outlook of Pisão provides vistas of Caloura, Ribeira Chã and parts of the neighboring municipality of Vila Franca do Campo. Within the village, the Jardim dos Anjos, was begun during the 1970s and remodeled in 1991, and is a situated in front of the parochial church of Nossa Senhora dos Anjos.
In the civil parish of Santa Cruz, the Forest Park of Chã da Macela, located in the eastern foothills of Serra de Água de Pau, is a large park with endemic and introduced species. The Park of Convento dos Franciscanos is also an important tourist attraction in the parish.
The Praça de Nossa Senhora da Graça, a square in Lagoa is also another place of leisure that includes an open-air amphitheater, used in local cultural and recreational events. Similarly, the Largo de Ville Sainte Thérèse, in Rosário, was realized by contributions and partnerships signed in 1996 between the municipality and the Ville de Sainte Thérèse, in Canada: it symbolizes the friendship between the two communities.
The civil parish of Nossa Senhora do Rosário, is recognized for the Porto dos Carneiros, a small bay where the first settlers and fisherman disembarked; it is the original port where those colonists landed cattle and provisions for the original settlers. Its location has been expanded and remodeled in the 20th century to both support the local community and to attract tourists to the Mercado de Peixe and restaurants along the port. The main attraction along the southern coast of Roário is the open-air Complexo Municipal de Piscinas ; situated along Rua Cidade de New Bedford, the complex combines natural, semi-olympic and children's artificial pools with infrastructures.jpg|220px|thumb|The pool complex integrates natural pools...

Architecture

Civic