BUENOS AIRES AREA BY AREA - Argentina - page 73

wife Eva, as well as photo
exhibitions of post-dictatorship
leaders including Raúl Alfonsín,
Carlos Menem, and the Kirchners.
One highlight is the automobile
collection, which includes a
vehicle that belonged to former
president Hipólito Yrigoyen.
The museum also hosts a
permanent display of artifacts
found during excavations,
including parts of the govern-
ment building, as well as
ceramics and animal bones.

A family of black-necked swans, Reserva Ecológica Costanera Sur

at the ecological preserve,
formally recognized as such in
1986. Well-marked footpaths
wind through the leafy park,
drawing joggers, trekkers, and
cyclists. Apart from the daily
ranger walks, guides lead
groups on tours by moonlight
every month.

cargo ships, and between 1911
and 1925 another port - Puerto
Nuevo - was built a few miles
north. For more than 50 years
Puerto Madero was left to decay,
but in the early 1990s the area
was rebuilt and a yacht club,
restaurants, and a boutique hotel
soon followed. In August 1998,
Puerto Madero became Buenos
Aires's 47th official barrio . It is
unique as the only neighborhood
in the city where all the streets
are named after women.
Some porteños have criticized
the gentrification of Puerto
Madero as too elitist and lacking
in cultural sites. Worth seeing,
however, are Spanish architect
Santiago Calatrava's Puente de
la Mujer (Woman's Bridge), the
Coleccion de Arte Amalia
Lacroze de Fortabat featuring
Argentinian art, and the ship
Presidente Sarmiento, built in
Birkenhead - a British port town
famous for its shipbuilding skills
- which is now a floating
maritime museum named
Buque Museo Fragata
Presidente Sarmiento .

f Reserva
Ecológica
Costanera Sur
Ave Tristán Achaval Rodríguez 1550.
City Map 3 F4. Te l [phone].
@ 99, 2. Open Apr−Oct: 8am−

4:30pm Tue−Sun; Nov−Mar: 8am−
5:30pm Tue-Sun. 10am & 2pm

Sat & Sun (Spanish only).

8

g Puerto Madero
East of Microcentro. City Map 3 F5.
Te l [phone].

In the 1970s, there was an
attempt to reclaim the bog-
lands of the riverside Costanera
Sur using the Dutch polder
system, which involves the
draining and recovering of
a water-covered area. When
the development ran into
difficulties, the land was
colonized by tall pampas grass
and four lakes were formed,
creating an ideal wetland for the
wading birds that migrate to
the Pampas region each spring.
Southern screamers, southern
lapwings, coots, wattled jacanas,
and flamingos are among the
200 species that can be spotted

@ 152, 111, 109.

∑ puertomadero.com Buque

Museo Fragata Presidente Sarmiento:
Open 10am-7pm daily. ara.mil.ar

Coleccion de Arte Amalia Lacroze
de Fortabat: Open noon-8pm
Tue−Sun.

∑

& 8 3pm, 5pm.

∑ coleccionfortabat.org.ar

Built as a result of a competition
held to design a new dock at
Buenos Aires, Puerto Madero was
used to store grain and other
perishables during the exports
boom of the late 19th century.
However, the narrow wharves in
this red-brick dockland proved
unsuited to larger, more modern

The elegant Puente de la Mujer bridge at the Puerto Madero docks