Past Duration with "Hacía"
To express how long an ongoing situation had been happening up to a certain point in the past, use hacía followed by a time period.
The formula is: Hacía + [amount of time] + que + [verb in the imperfect tense]
| This room had remained intact for years. | Hacía años que este cuarto permanecía intacto. |
| We had been exploring the rotten balcony for hours. | Hacía horas que explorábamos el balcón podrido. |
Using the Imperfect Tense
Notice that English often uses "had been doing" or "had remained" for these expressions. In Spanish, however, you simply use the imperfect tense because the action was still an ongoing background state at that time in the past.
| The cobwebs had been decorating the ceiling for a long time. | Hacía mucho tiempo que las telarañas decoraban el techo. |
| The crack had been growing for months. | Hacía meses que la grieta crecía. |
Negative Duration
To say how long it had been since something happened (meaning an action had not been happening), just put no immediately before the imperfect verb.
| The inhabitants had not walked around here for a century. | Hacía un siglo que los habitantes no caminaban por aquí. |
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