The article concentrates itself in the environmental conditions of the city of Santiago at that time as viewed by some national critics as well as by some foreign travellers. It covers different aspects such as housing problems, transportation, and health mainly, which are enhaced by the different writers at that time. The critics posed by the local writers to the living conditions show a deep and complex crisis in the country, its institutions and covering all the people, in a general overview. There seem to be a generalized view of an idyllic situation among the popular sectors of the city, view that is strongly demystified by the authors through the very critic statements gathered from different sources steming from period. These testimonies help us to appreciate in a more detatched manner the prevailing ideas about the environmental problems at that time.