CITIES are not created by accident, and this is true for Metro Manila and the rest of the Philippines. However, long before the Metropolitan Manila Development Authority, LGUs and the national government existed, there were greater forces laying the foundation. The Philippine urban system, as we know it today, is the result of more than four years of colonial influence layered upon indigenous settlements.
Pre-colonial times
Long before colonial rule, the archipelago already had thriving communities known as barangay (villages). Settlements such as Manila, Cebu and Butuan were active trading ports connected to regional networks across Southeast Asia and China. These were not “cities” in the Western sense, but rather clusters of coastal communities organized around trade, rivers and local leadership under the datus.
The geography of our early settlements reflected the maritime character of the archipelago: decentralized, coastal and connected by water. These communities were governed by the datus, who in turn answered to their respective rajahs or sultans, with the social pecking order divided into the maginoo (nobility), the maharlika (warriors), and the alipin (slaves).
Spanish period
The arrival of Spain in the 16th century fundamentally transformed this pattern. Through a policy known as reducción, dispersed settlements were reorganized into centralized towns. These pueblos followed a standardized plan based on Spanish colonial principles: a central plaza surrounded by the church, municipal hall and key civic buildings.
This urban model can still be seen in cities and municipalities around the country, and if one looks hard enough, you will find that big property developers have also made use of this model to inform the planning of their townships or mixed-use estates.
One of the best preserved examples of Spain’s impact on the Philippines’ urban landscape is the walled city of Intramuros, which became the seat of Spanish influence in Asia. From this fortified capital, Spain governed the archipelago and integrated it into the global economy through the historic Manila-Acapulco Galleon Trade.
The walls of Intramuros were designed to keep the rabble away from the archipelago’s colonial administrators and immigrants, an early form of separating the haves from the have-nots in Manila. This colonial mode of development is, in fact, the precursor of today’s gated communities — one of the most popular residential housing typologies in the country.
The Spanish also brought to these shores the concept of private property, which included the possession of land. As a tropical archipelago, the Philippines was seen as a gold mine of opportunity for agricultural development, which the Spanish made use of by cultivating imported crops like maize, tobacco and coffee, or scaling up the production of sugarcane.
To support these agricultural industries, the Spanish assembled large tracts of land in different parts of the country, awarding ownership of these estates to religious orders or private individuals of great standing. These vast estates became the canvas for which developers shaped the nation’s urban landscape hundreds of years later.
The American period
When the Americans arrived at the turn of the 20th century, they introduced a new phase of city building grounded in modern planning principles. American planners brought ideas of sanitation, land use and zoning, infrastructure and civic design.
The renowned planner Daniel Burnham prepared visionary plans for Manila and Baguio, envisioning grand boulevards, waterfront parks and well-organized civic centers, in line with the City Beautiful movement. Burnham’s legacy lives on in the neoclassical government architecture of Old Manila, Roxas Boulevard and Burnham Park in Baguio.
These plans were ambitious and forward-looking. Although not fully realized, they laid the foundations of modern planning in the Philippines. Provincial capitals expanded, infrastructure networks improved, and cities such as Iloilo City, Zamboanga City and Davao City began to grow as regional hubs.
During World War II, Manila was razed to the ground, battles fought in the city erased much of the architectural heritage Manila was known for, offering the country a clean slate for new development and urban rehabilitation.
Shaping the modern Filipino urban landscape
The postwar years, and even up until the present day, have seen how colonial decisions paved the way for developing underutilized swaths of land for new neighborhoods and cities. Earlier in the article, I pointed out how the great friar estates of the colonial period became the canvas for new urban development in the country.
The most classic example is the development of Makati, once a hacienda before it was acquired by the Zobel family, who in turn transformed it into a community for new beginnings within the Manila area, with suburbs anchored by a central business district. The Makati villages were no doubt inspired by the suburban town planning of Palo Alto, California. Once inside the gates of these villages, we see that nearly all the homes inside are themselves gated too, a reminder of one of the last vestiges of exclusionary colonial planning that has been replicated in many other mixed-use estates like Rockwell, BGC and Nuvali.
Clearly, the structure of our urban system still bears the imprint of our colonial history. The plaza-centered towns established during Spanish rule remain the nuclei of many municipalities; malls have churches; privately owned public open spaces are still the gold standard in open spaces around the country, and the infrastructure and planning frameworks introduced during the American period still guide the layout of many cities, while the primacy of Metro Manila continues to define the national urban hierarchy.
These are not practices that we will shy away from, as they are ingrained in our collective cultural memory. The best we can do to move forward is for planners and developers to ensure that the spaces they build are designed for people and for the benefit of external community members as well, as it is our duty to provide the nation with spaces to thrive in. If not, these decisions will lead to the continued uglification of our cities, rather than their beautification.
Today, as we plan for the future, it is important to recognize these historical layers, to allow us to address long-standing imbalances in development. The Philippines is an archipelago of more than 7,000 islands, and our urban system must reflect this geography by strengthening regional cities, enhancing connectivity and creating new centers of opportunity beyond the capital.
Urban planning and design are not only about buildings and roads, or drawing lines on a map. It is about shaping the future while learning from the past. By understanding the historical conditions that influenced the development of our cities, we can design a more balanced, resilient and humane urban future for the Philippines.
Architect-urban planner Felino “Jun” Palafox Jr. has 53 years’ experience in architecture and 51 years in planning. He was educated at Christ the King Seminary, UST, UP and Harvard. He founded Palafox Associates and Palafox Architecture Group, with 2,000 projects in 41 countries, and was recognized with 200 plus awards, including the UAP Dubai Awards First Lifetime Achievement Award (2023).
