Plaza Las Delicias

Plaza Las Delicias
Plaza Degetau, one of two main plazas at Plaza Las Delicias
Type	Municipal Plaza and Urban park
Location	Ponce, Puerto Rico
Coordinates	18°00′42″N 66°36′52″W / 18.01167°N 66.61444°W / 18.01167; -66.61444
Area	2.2 acres (0.89 ha)
Created	1670
Operated by	Autonomous Municipality of Ponce
Visitors	over 200,000
Status	Opened all year, 24 hours/day

Plaza Las Delicias is the main plaza in the city of Ponce, Puerto Rico. The square is notable for its fountains and for the various monuments it contains. The historic Parque de Bombas and Ponce Cathedral buildings are located within the plaza, which actually consists of two squares: Plaza Muñoz Rivera on the north end, and Plaza Degetau on the southern end. The square is the center of the Ponce Historic Zone, and it is flanked by the historic Ponce City Hall to the south, the early 19th-century Teatro Fox Delicias to the north, the NRHP-listed Banco Crédito y Ahorro Ponceño and Banco de Ponce buildings to the east, and the Armstrong-Poventud Residence to the west. The square dates back to the early Spanish settlement in Ponce of 1670. It is the main tourist attraction of the city, receiving about a quarter of a million visitors per year.

According to the traditional Spanish colonial custom, a town's main square, or plaza, was the center of the town. In the case of Ponce, a Catholic church was built on the center of the plaza, thus splitting the plaza into two sections. The Plaza Las Delicias square is, thus, actually made up of two plazas. The north section of the square is named Plaza Luis Muñoz Rivera (Luis Muñoz Rivera square), while the south section is called Plaza Federico Degetau (Federico Degetau square). Plaza Las Delicias measures 8,800 square meters.

The history of Plaza Las Delicias dates back to as far as the creation of the first Catholic chapel in Ponce in 1670. It is also known that around 1840 Mayor Salvador de Vives planted trees as a renovation project for Plaza Las Delicias. It was first lit in 1864.