Torà

Torà (Catalan pronunciation: [toˈɾa]; Spanish: Torá) is a town and municipality in the North East of the comarca (county) of Solsonès, in the province of Lleida, Catalonia, Spain. The urban structure of the center has retained most of its original design, with narrow, twisting streets and blocks formed by rows of attached buildings. The Medieval town grew around a castle or fortified place (Thoranum castrum). A particular trait of the fortified origin of the town is the presence of a number of portals to allow several streets their pass through defensive barriers formed by the rows of buildings of the town and its walls. Torà is some 10 kilometers northeast from the more populated Guissona (7,774), a neighbor town that has experienced an important economic development in the last half century (mainly due to meat production and generation of a meat packing industry) parallel to an unprecedented demographic growth sped up in the recent years (from 3,060 inhabitants in 1998 to 6,145 in 2010). The municipality stretches along la Vall (valley) de la Riera (creek or brook) de Llanera (the Valley of Llanera's Creek) up to the confluence with the Llobregós River. Its orography is rather uneven with the lowest point at 430m and peaks rising up to 850m above sea level. The North sector features el Tossal (a kind of hill) de l'Aguda (L'Aguda's Hill), el Tossal de Sant Donat (Snat Donat's Hill), and the creek named la Riera de Llanera flowing across. On the other hand, the South sector features the hills el Tossal de Sant Pere and el Tossal de la Pineda, crossed by la Riera de Cellers, one of the Riera de Llanera's tributary brooks merging on its left. The town is settled by the left bank of the creek la Riera de Llanera, near the...