Luis Huergo

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Luis Augusto Huergo
Elderly Huergo.
Born(1837-11-01)November 1, 1837
Buenos Aires, Argentina
DiedNovember 4, 1913(1913-11-04) (aged 76)
NationalityArgentine
EducationCivil engineering, University of Buenos Aires
OccupationEngineer

Luis Augusto Huergo (November 1, 1837 – November 4, 1913) was an

Argentine engineer
prominent in the development of his country's ports.

Life and times

Early career

Luis Huergo was born in

Jesuit Mount St. Mary's University previously known as Mount St. Mary's College, where he obtained his secondary education from 1852 to 1857. Returning to Argentina, he assisted urbanist Pedro Benoit plan the first road to Ensenada (a harbor town 56 km (35 mi) south of Buenos Aires) and earned a degree as a surveyor from the Topography and Geodesics School of Buenos Aires, in 1862. Huergo was among the first class to enroll at the School of Engineering created by the Rector of the University of Buenos Aires, Juan María Gutiérrez, in 1866, and four years later, his thesis on the value of roads earned him the school's first engineering degree.[1]

Huergo designed

San Fernando. Huergo co-founded the Argentine Scientific Society in 1872 and the Argentine Geographic Institute, in 1879.[2]
He taught at the newly created School of Mathematics of the University of Buenos Aires from 1874, and was designated its dean in 1881.

The port

Huergo's plans to build a house at the mouth of the

Argentine Congress, though the backing of Argentina's main financier (Barings Bank) for a proposal put forth by local import-export mogul Eduardo Madero helped sway congre ssional support away from Huergo's proposal. Madero's project was approved by Congress in 1882.[4]

Huergo appealed the decision on the grounds that it would be uneconomical to build and difficult to modify, once new, larger freighters began to arrive. Madero's project was signed into law by President

Julio Roca in 1884, however, and in 1886, Huergo resigned his post at the Riachuelo Bureau.[1]

New projects and a new port

Huergo continued to campaign against the costly

Córdoba to the Paraná River, over 320 km (200 mi) to the east, and the Port of Asunción, Paraguay.[1]

The accomplished engineer was named director of the

maritime shipping, had increased dramatically since Huergo's proposal for the Port of Buenos Aires had been passed over in 1882. The tonnage of vessels arriving at the port jumped from 4 million to 20 million by 1907, and in September of that year, Congress approved the construction of a new port. The facility would be built north of Madero's nearly-obsolete docks, and the design would be Huergo's. Work started in 1911 on the massive, new port, which included six open inner harbors, separated by cargo piers and protected by two breakwaters.[5]

Luis Huergo did not live to see the new port's completion, and he died in 1913, at age 76. His port design solved the very limitations he had anticipated for the former facility, and his many and early contributions to his country's infrastructure made him Argentina's "first engineer."[1]

References and external links

  1. ^ a b c d Planetario Galilei: Luis Hergo (in Spanish) Archived 2009-10-25 at the Wayback Machine
  2. ^ Monografías (in Spanish)
  3. ^ Puerto Madero: history Archived 2009-09-23 at the Wayback Machine
  4. ^ "Puerto Madero {{in lang|es}}". Archived from the original on 2010-11-13. Retrieved 2009-05-11.
  5. ^ Puerto Nuevo Archived 2009-05-09 at the Wayback Machine
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