"Circle", as locals call it, has been undergoing significant changes in order to lure in more tourists both local and foreign. Due to these beautification efforts of the local government the number of visitors is continuously increasing.[2][3]
History
The site was originally intended as the grounds of the National Capitol to be built in Quezon City to house the Congress of the Philippines. The location was also part of a larger National Government Center located around Elliptical Road and the Quezon City Quadrangle (made up of the North, South, East, and West Triangles). The NGC was meant to house the three branches of the Philippine government (legislative, executive, and judicial). While the cornerstone for the structure was laid on November 15, 1940, only the foundations were in place when construction was interrupted by the beginning of the Second World War in the Philippines.[4] After World War II in December 1945, President Sergio Osmeña issued Executive Order No. 79 stipulating the creation of a Quezon Memorial Committee to raise funds by public subscription to erect a memorial to his predecessor, President Manuel L. Quezon.[5][6]
Former Quezon City Mayor Tomas Morato was instrumental to the selection of the site of the memorial park. President Elpidio Quirino proposed the relocation of the monument, but this was opposed by Morato, who resigned from his post as congressman representing the 2nd district of Quezon province in 1949 due to disputes over Quirino's plan.[7]
A national contest for the Quezon Memorial Project was held 1951. Filipino architect Federico Ilustre's design won the contest.[8] Aside from the monument itself, a complex of three buildings, including a presidential library, a museum, and a theater, were also planned to be erected.
In the 1970s, the undeveloped grounds of the memorial circle was used for the mass celebrated by Pope Paul VI.[citation needed]
Shortly after the People Power Revolution in 1986, the Quezon City Parks Development Foundation (QCPDF) was established during the term of then Quezon City Mayor, Brigido Simon Jr.[9] Under a tripartite agreement between the Quezon City government, National Historical Institute (NHI, now the National Historical Commission of the Philippines) and the National Parks Development Administration (NPDA), the NPDA was given jurisdiction over the 27 hectares (67 acres) park except a one hectare area covering the Quezon Memorial Shrine which is under the NHI. The NPDA turned over the management of the park to the QCPDF and the city government gave the foundation authority to raise revenue for the maintenance of the park.[9]
In the 1980s, the architecture firm of Francisco Mañosa made a masterplan for the park sometime in the 1980s.[10]
On July 1, 2008, the QCPDF which has been managing the park from September 27, 1988, transferred management duties to the Quezon City government.[11]
During the COVID-19 pandemic, the park was the site of makeshift dormitories for health workers employed in nearby hospitals[12] and a testing site.[13]
The Quezon Memorial Shrine is an art deco-themed monument designed by Federico Ilustre and was built during the 1950s – serving as the centerpiece of the Quezon Memorial Circle. The 66-meter (217 ft) shrine[1] representing Quezon's age when he died from tuberculosis stands on a thirty-six hectare elliptical lot. It houses an observation deck that can accommodate sixty people at the top through a spiral staircase which gives the visitors a panoramic view of the city.[14]
Tomb of President Manuel Quezon and his wife Aurora located at Quezon Memorial Circle, Quezon City
At the top of the pylons are three mourning angels holding sampaguita (the national flower) wreaths[1] sculpted by the Italian sculptor Francesco Monti. The regional identity of each female angels figure could be discerned in the traditional costume they were clothed with.[15] The winged figures atop the three pylons represented Luzon, Visayas, and Mindanao.[1] The three pylons would in turn circumscribe a drum-like two-story structure containing a gallery from which visitors could look down at Quezon's catafalque, modeled after Napoleon Bonaparte's in the Invalides. The gallery and the catafalque below are lit by an oculus, in turn reminiscent of Grant's Tomb.
The planned auxiliary structures (presidential library, museum, and theater) were never built. Two smaller museums, one containing the presidential memorabilia of Quezon, and the other containing items on the history of Quezon City, were installed within the Shrine itself. In the 1980s, missing, lost, or incomplete bas reliefs for the outside of the memorial were installed.
The Presidential Car Museum, housing the presidential cars of former Philippine presidents, was inaugurated on August 19, 2018.[16]
Recreation spaces
Quezon City Circle also hosts the Circle of Fun, a small amusement park[17] which has various rides such as the "Fun Drop" a drop tower ride and the "Sea Dragon", a pirate ship type of amusement ride. A separate attraction, the Pedal N Paddle offers go-kart rides, boat rides in a small pond, fish spa, a 4D theater and Skybike, where patrons ride modified bicycles attached on an elevated rail.[18]
A children's playground and a rental bicycles are also available which can be used on a bicycle track within the park. Dining outlets and a flea market are also situated within park grounds.[19]
Previously the park had a disco area near the Quezon Memorial Shrine[20] but it has been closed down.[when?]
Public facilities for events such as the Seminar Hall, Century Hall, People’s Hall, and a stage, as well as covered courts were introduced by the city government which took over administration of the park in 2008. A dancing fountain was also renovated by the city government which is illuminated with colors at night.[21]
Gardens, monuments, and markers
Hardin ng Mga Bulaklak gate.World Peace BellWelcome statue of President Manuel Quezon at Quezon Memorial Circle
The elliptical park features smaller gardens and named green spaces within its grounds such as the Hardin ng Mga Bulaklak (lit.'Garden of Flowers') and the Tropical Garden.[22] The Quezon Memorial Circle also host a demo urban farm which in 2015 is occupying a 1,500 square meters (16,000 sq ft). The urban farm inside the park is one of the several sites under the "Joy of Urban Farming" project of Vice Mayor Joy Belmonte which was launched in 2010.[23][24] In 2011, the Cactus and Succulent Garden designed by Serapion Metilla was opened to the public.[25]
Among the other areas of the park is the World Peace Bell. The bell installed not before 1994, was a donation of the World Peace Bell Association, a Japanese organization promoting awareness on the world peace movement. The Philippines was the first Southeast Asian nation to receive a bell from the association.[26] The first bell was made from coins donated by the then 65 member countries of the United Nations, weighs 365 kilograms (805 lb), has a height of 1.05 meters (3.4 ft), and a diameter of 60 centimeters (24 in). It was designed by the Quezon City Planning Office.[27]
The bell was turned over to then Quezon City Vice Mayor Charito Planas by World Peace Bell Association Executive Chairman Tomojiro Yoshida at the Tsunamachi Mitsui Club in Tokyo on July 1, 1994. The bell was inaugurated by then President Fidel V. Ramos on December 10, 1994, who formally presented the bell to then Quezon City Mayor Ismael Mathay.[27]
A Peace Monument was also erected inside the grounds of the park by the Rotary Club. It marked Quezon City as a Rotary Peace City as part of the "Community Peace Cities/Towns" concept conceived by the Rotary Club of Wagga Wagga, Australia.[28] Quezon City is the fifth Rotary Peace Community in the Philippines and 25th in the world. The peace monument was inaugurated on December 7, 1999.[29] The monument was removed due to the construction of the Quezon Memorial Circle Station of MRT-7.
The Philippine–Israel Friendship Park is hosted within the larger Quezon Memorial Circle beside the Quezon Heritage House.[30] The park had its groundbreaking in December 2017 and was inaugurated in August 2018.[30] It commemorate President Manuel L. Quezon's efforts to accept 1,000 Jewish refugees in the Philippines during the World War II era and the Philippines' support for the United Nations Partition Plan for Palestine and the establishment of the State of Israel.[31]
Transportation
The Quezon Memorial Circle is totally engulfed by the Elliptical Road. A ₱49 million pedestrian underpass was opened in October 2007 which connects the lot occupied by the Quezon City Hall and the park.[32] A second underpass connects the park to the Philcoa area near the Commonwealth Avenue[18] amounted to ₱87 million and opened in December 2009.[33]
As of 2017, the Quezon Memorial Circle hosts five restaurants and 13 food stalls. There are also 19 kiosks, 39 plant stalls, as well as 21 stalls from Agri-Aqua Network International. 7 other establishments also has presence in the park including the TEC bike rental, Pedal n Paddle Inc., and Philippine Mango Seedling.[34] Following a planned redevelopment of the park by Mayor Joy Belmonte some stall vendors and restaurants surrounding the park's children's playground vacated the park after their permit expired on June 30, 2019.[35] Within the same year, Belmonte launched the Fresh Market, a weekly farmer-to-consumer program, that would allow farmers from nearby provinces to sell produce to residents within the park.[36]
Visitors
Fireworks entertain visitors of the Quezon Memorial Circle on January 1, 2023.
In 2012, it was reported that an average of 8,000 people visit the Quezon Memorial Circle daily. The average figures during the weekends were reportedly higher during the weekends amounting to 12,000 people. In December 2011, more than a million visited the park.[21]
^ abcd"Introduction". Quezon Memorial Shrine. Retrieved February 27, 2016. The Quezon Memorial Shrine is dedicated to the unrivalled legacy of the first president of the Commonwealth of the Philippines, Manuel L. Quezon. It is a national shrine highlighted by a 66-meter trylon monument at the heart of Quezon City's most important park. The monument's three columns and angels bowed in grief, holding sampaguita wreaths, represent Luzon, Visayas, and Mindanao. It has a museum that features Quezoniana relics and memorabilia, and a mausoleum where the remains of Quezon and his wife, Aurora Aragon Quezon, were interred.
^"Developments at the Quezon Memorial Circle". The Local Government of Quezon City. Retrieved February 27, 2016. The Quezon City Government is continuously improving the Quezon Memorial Circle as a people's park and a fitting place for the shrine of a Philippine President. The place is not a forest park. On an ordinary day, when there are no special events there, an average of 8,000 people visit the park daily, with numbers increasing to 12,000 on weekends, and to over a million last December as more families chose to celebrate the holidays in affordable style outdoors.
^"Federico S. Ilustre". Arkitekturang Filipino Online. Art Studies Foundation, Inc., National Commission for Culture and the Arts, and United Architects of the Philippines. Retrieved March 5, 2013.
^ abJimenez-David, Rina (February 29, 2000). "What it takes to run a park". Philippine Daily Inquirer. Retrieved August 3, 2016.
^Lico, Gerard (2008). Arkitekturang Filipino: A History of Architecture and Urbanism in the Philippines. Quezon City: The University of the Philippines Press. p. 398. ISBN978-971-542-579-7.
^Rowthorn, Chris; Bloom, Greg; Day, Michael; Grosberg, Michael; Ver Berkmoes, Ryan (2006). Philippines (9th ed.). Paris: Lonely planet. p. 85. ISBN9781741042894.
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