Final answer:
The statement is true; in traditional Spanish cities and their Latin American counterparts, the wealthy lived in the city center with better infrastructure, while the poorer population lived farther away in less serviced areas.
Step-by-step explanation:
The statement regarding the correlation between one's proximity to the center of a Spanish town and their wealth is generally true. In traditional Spanish urban design, which influenced Latin American cities as well, the city centers were reserved for plazas, grand boulevards, and housing for the wealthy and powerful. These areas were well-supported by public infrastructure such as transportation and utilities. The poorer populations lived farther from these centers, often in the outskirts or newly developing zones called barrios or favelas, where public service provisions were much less adequate and could lead to isolated communities.
Thus, the farther away from the middle of a Spanish town or its culturally influenced Latin American counterparts one lived, the less affluent they were likely to be. This is because the core of the cities—mirroring the Spanish design prescribed in the Law of the Indies—was reserved for the more opulent residential districts and important commercial, governmental, and religious buildings.