Ildefonso Cerdà and the development of gas in Barcelona

Abstract

This paper explains the scarcely known interventions of the Bridges and Roads Engineer Ildefonso Cerdà in the installation of gas networks in Barcelona. From his position, first, as councilman and afterwards as syndic in the Town Council of Barcelona and by his friendship with the French promoter Charles Lebon, Cerdà had opportunity of determine some administrative politics in order to avoid the monopoly on a unitary process of production, distribution and consumption of an article, the gas, that soon showed its qualities to modify the industrial frame and the commercial structure of the city. In the article is shown, also, the professional corporativism and the competition between the Bridges and Road Engineers, which intendend to maintain the promotions of Industrial Engineers out of the installation of gasworks, due to the youth of the new academic discipline. However, and as was occurring already in other European countries, finally the Industrial Engineers were acquiring the necessary knowledge to have an decisive influence upon he development of the new industry.