Vayas is one of the 31 barrios of the municipalityofPonce, Puerto Rico. Along with Playa, Bucana, Canas and Capitanejo, Vayas is also one of Ponce's five coastal barrios. Together with Capitanejo, Vayas is also one of two rural coastal barrios in the municipality.[3] It was organized in 1831, at which time it was divided into Vayas Norte and Vayas Sur; in 1878 the two were subsequently merged into today's Vayas.[4]
Barrio Vayas is one of the oldest barrios in Ponce, dating from the 1780s. Its name can be seen spelled as "Bayas", "Vallas, and even "Ballas", but the official name is nowadays spelled "Vayas". It is believed that name came from the stakes used by farmers to mark the extension of their lands, in the times when those lands were used for pasturing herds.[5]
Vayas is a rural, coastal barrio located in the southern region of the municipality, east of downtown Ponce, and southeast of the traditional center of the city, Plaza Las Delicias. It is located at 18.0107°N 66.5567°W, with an elevation of 43 feet.[6] The toponymy, or origin of the name, is related to the edges or boundary (a type of fencing) to cordon off a land area or barrio.[7]
It is bounded on the North by PR-1 and La Esperanza Street, on the South by the Caribbean Sea, on the West by Bucara Street/Los Caobos Avenue, PR-52 (roughly), and the Costa Caribe Country Club East Access Road, and on the East by Río Inabón.[8][9][10][11]
Unlike most other barrios of Ponce, Vayas' landscape is entirely flat. Vayas has the third longest coastline of all five of Ponce's coastal barrios, after Canas and Playa. Vayas has 7.1 square miles (18 km2) of land area and 3.4 square miles (8.8 km2) of water area.[14][15]
In 2000, the population of Vayas was 1,338 persons, and it had a density of 188 persons per square mile.[10][16]
In 2010, the population of Vayas was 901 persons, and it had a density of 127.1 persons per square mile.[17]
The main roads serving barrio Vayas are PR-52 and PR-1.
^Sunny A. Cabrera Salcedo. Hacia un Estudio Integral de la Toponimia del Municipio de Ponce, Puerto Rico. Ph. D. dissertation. May 1999. University of Massachusetts Amherst. Graduate School. Department of Spanish and Portuguese. Page 22.
^Barrios de Ponce.Archived 30 September 2015 at the Wayback Machine Antepasados Esclavos.(From: Pedro Tomás de Córdoba. Memorias geográficas, históricas, económicas y estadísticas de la Isla de Puerto Rico.) Retrieved 28 November 2014.
^Eli Oquendo-Rodriguez. Barrios de Ponce: Noticias y microhistorias de ocho comunidades ponceñas en la historia, siglos XVI al XIX. 2019. p. 207. ISBN9781076759153
^Government of the Municipality of Ponce. Periódico "El Señorial". Special issue: Carnaval Ponceño 2013. February 2013. Page 17. Ponce, Puerto Rico.
^Webcensus.Archived 12 August 2010 at the Wayback Machine Government of the Commonwealth of Puerto Rico. General Purpose Population Data, Census 2000. Unidad de Sistemas de Información Geográfica, Área de Tecnología de Información Gubernamental, Oficina de Gerencia y Presupuesto. Gobierno de Puerto Rico. Retrieved 24 February 2010.
^Maptest.Archived 18 February 2010 at the Wayback Machine Government of the Commonwealth of Puerto Rico. General Purpose Population Data, Census 2000. Unidad de Sistemas de Información Geográfica, Área de Tecnología de Información Gubernamental, Oficina de Gerencia y Presupuesto. Gobierno de Puerto Rico. Retrieved 24 February 2010.
^Eli Oquendo-Rodriguez. Barrios de Ponce: Noticias y microhistorias de ocho comunidades ponceñas en la historia, siglos XVI al XIX. 2019. p. 209. ISBN9781076759153