Mixco

Mixco on the map of Guatemala

Mixco is a city in Guatemala. It is the administrative seat of the greater community ( municipality ) in the department of Guatemala. Mixco is part of the agglomeration of Guatemala City.

Geography

The municipality is 132 km ² and more than half a million inhabitants along with Villanueva is the second largest of the 17 municipios of the department. It is located in the southern highlands of the Sierra Madre, on the western edge of the criss-crossed by several ravines High Valley Valle de La Ermita (also Valle de La Virgen de las Vacas or Valle ) at about 1600 meters height. Almost half of the Municipalities in the range of the valley, the rest extending into the mountain ranges in the north, west and south. The once extensive forests of Municipalities had to gradually recede in favor of urban and industrial development. The climate is temperate, temperatures hover usually 12 to 28 ° C, the rainy season lasts from May to October.

The original town of Mixco is 17 km west of the center of Guatemala City. The area between them was almost completely inhabited in the past five decades and is now part of the metropolitan area of the capital.

Adjacent Municipalities are San Pedro Sacatepéquez in the north, San Raimundo and Chinautla in the northeast, Guatemala City in the east and Villanueva in the south. In the West Mixco borders the Municipalities of San Lucas Sacatepéquez and Santiago Sacatepéquez the neighboring departments Sacatepéquez.

Population

In the public perception Mixco is seen as an integral part of Guatemala City for a long time. For information on the number of inhabitants of Guatemala City is often the officially around 500,000 inhabitants of Mixco be added, although both are administratively independent. Mixco is one of the fastest growing communities of Guatemala and to some estimates, almost one million inhabitants. Involved here are also commuters who come under on working days with relatives or acquaintances, and people who are officially in other departments or even not registered yet live in Mixco.

In Mixco large housing projects have been implemented since the 1970s. For this purpose, inter alia, the district Ciudad San Cristóbal in the south part of the Municipalities, which together with its approximately 150,000 inhabitants today is a city in the city. Lately, the construction industry has built a number of terraced houses for the small, emerging middle class on the outskirts of Mixco on former fincas. Some older settlements and individual districts are, however, become socially deprived areas with high crime rates.

History

The origins of Mixco are unclear. 1525 Pedro de Alvarado conquered with his Spanish troops and indigenous mercenaries, the former Pocomam City and later Cakchiquel Fortress Mixco Viejo (Old Mixco ), which is located about 50 km north of Mixco in what is now the department of Chimaltenango. According to legend, he moved to the remaining inhabitants of the ruined city in what is now Mixco. Mixco Viejo was excavated in the 1950s by French researchers and finally reconstructed. Whether it is the old Mixco is doubted. It was probably at Chinautla ( Chinautla Viejo), about 25 km northeast of present-day Mixco where Alvarado insurgent Pocomam submitted. Mixco was founded by Alvarado as Santo Domingo Mixco on August 4, 1526 a military easily controlled area. The already established there and the resettled Pocomam told you to Spanish encomenderos. During the colonial period the city to the administrative district of Santiago de los Caballeros de Goathemala or belonged to the local Alcaldía Mayor de Sacatepéquez. Even after the independence from Spain (1821 ) Mixco remained until the 1950s, a small, insignificant municipality in the west of Guatemala City. 1950 had 11,784 inhabitants, of whom 4,181 in the former village. Gradually, however, created other larger settlements, including the Colonia La Florida, which at the time was almost completely surrounded by forest and was slammed because of the insufficient performance of the municipality of Mixco 1958 exclave of the municipality of Guatemala City. Although La Florida today is located in Mixco and the circumstances have otherwise changed completely, the district is still one of the capital. After the devastating earthquake of 1976 attracted from across the country countless homeless people to the capital and settled in their surrounding areas, also in the municipality of Mixco. The general population explosion and the establishment of numerous industrial plants in the following decades led to the coalescence of the urban areas of Mixco Guatemala City.

The Nahuatl name Mixco comes from the Mexican mercenaries Alvarado and means " clouds cloudy place ".

Economy and Transport

The expansion of Mixco took place mainly along two major entry and exit roads of the capital: the running in the east-west direction Calzada Roosevelt, which is in the course of highway CA 1 Interamericana ( Pan-American ), and the branching of the Roosevelt to the northwest Calzada San Juan, which leads then as National Road 5 on San Juan Sacatepéquez in northern Guatemala. Focus on the Roosevelt numerous major industrial and service companies, including several branches of multinational companies, while predominate at the San Juan and along the numerous side roads smaller retailers and service providers. Other urban areas such as San Cristóbal or Bosques de San Nicolás were, with bridges and new roads connected because of the gorges that separate them from Guatemala City to the existing traffic routes, bringing the traffic situation has improved somewhat on these two roads. Public transport, apart from taxis, ensured by a dense network of bus routes. Public buses are overcrowded during peak hours and are often attacked, so private transport is increasing steadily. An extension of the emerging Busway (Trans- Metro) from Guatemala City until after Mixco is planned.

Others

Mixco is known for its Chicharones and for its cocoa. Major festivals are held in honor of the Virgin of Morenos and in August in honor of the patron saint Santo Domingo de Guzmán in January.

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