scholarly journals Chasing the city that cannot stop: Exploring transportation and urban co-development in São Paulo’s history

2021 ◽  
Vol 14 (1) ◽  
pp. 1075-1098
Author(s):  
Adriano Borges Costa ◽  
P. Christopher Zegras ◽  
Ciro Biderman

We present a historical analysis of transportation and urban development in São Paulo (Brazil), attempting to discern Granger causal effects using historical land-use and transportation data from 1881 to 2013. Our results align with the hypothesis commonly stated in the literature about the relevance of road transportation in São Paulo’s peripheral urban expansion during the twentieth century. We find, however, more complex relationships, and changes in them, over time. Over the entire 130 years, we find that urban expansion and road development pushed and pulled each other, in a somewhat “orderly” way. On the other hand, while roads are not linked to densification, we find that mass transit infrastructure did lead to building densification. Distinguishing among distinct periods adds further insights. Examining São Paulo’s “streetcar era” we find joint development of streetcar lines and urban expansion – evidence of joint development consistent with “streetcar suburbs.” Streetcars also led to building densification during this early period. In subsequent decades, up until the mid-1970s, mass transit investments are virtually non-existent and road transportation essentially chases urban expansion, not vice versa. Finally, the last four decades reveal a return to “orderly” patterns of road expansion and urbanization but no evidence of mass transit infrastructure’s effects on urbanization or densification. The analysis illustrates how transportation investment choices have important consequences for urban growth, exerting long-lasting influences on its urban form.

2019 ◽  
Vol 1 ◽  
pp. 1-1
Author(s):  
Jing Yao ◽  
Ya Ping Wang ◽  
Xiaoxiang Zhang

<p><strong>Abstract.</strong> China has experienced high rate urbanization in recent years, with urban population increased from 460 to 750 million and the built-up area of metropolis expanded by almost 60% since 2000. Urban landscape has been dramatically changed by intensified inner-city development and urban sprawl. In recent years, the changes in urban form has transformed from expansion to restructuring. A good understanding of urban expansion and spatial restructuring as a consequence of urbanization has important policy implications, enhancing the knowledge of spatial variations in urban growth in transitional Chinese cities and assisting with sustainable urban and regional planning.</p><p>Using the Landsat satellite images from 1995 to 2015, this research explores urban expansion and its spatial patterns in second-tier Chinese cities, taking Tianjin, Hangzhou and Chengdu as examples, which are the leaders in the urbanization in Northern, Eastern and Western China, respectively. The study area includes the city proper in the three case study cities. Figure 1 shows the expansion of urban area in the three cities over the study time period. By visual inspection, it can be observed that the spatial pattern of urban land use growth varies across the three cities. For example, Tianjin has been largely expanding towards the east, particularly the Tianjin Binhai New Area, which has been rapidly developed into a new city core. The city of Chengdu seems having been expanding toward all directions of the surrounding area, integrated with the adjacent towns into a larger urban agglomeration. Further work will focus on quantitative analysis of the spatial patterns of urban expansion using geographical information system (GIS)-based spatial analytics, as well as the association between urban expansion and socioeconomic changes, with a reflection on the role of national/local policies.</p>


2021 ◽  
Vol 10 (2) ◽  
pp. 101
Author(s):  
Francisco Maturana ◽  
Mauricio Morales ◽  
Fernando Peña-Cortés ◽  
Marco A. Peña ◽  
Carlos Vielma

Urbanization is spreading across the world and beyond metropolitan areas. Medium-sized cities have also undergone processes of accelerated urban expansion, especially in Latin America, thanks to scant regulation or a complete lack thereof. Thus, understanding urban growth in the past and simulating it in the future has become a tool to raise its visibility and challenge territorial planners. In this work, we use Markov chains, cellular automata, multi-criteria multi-objective evaluation, and the determination of land use/land cover (LULC) to model the urban growth of the city of Temuco, Chile, a paradigmatic case because it has experienced powerful growth, where real estate development pressures coexist with a high natural value and the presence of indigenous communities. The urban scenario is determined for the years 2033 and 2049 based on the spatial patterns between 1985 and 2017, where the model shows the trend of expansion toward the northeast and significant development in the western sector of the city, making them two potential centers of expansion and conflict in the future given the heavy pressure on lands that are indigenous property and have a high natural value, aspects that need to be incorporated into future territorial planning instruments.


Religions ◽  
2020 ◽  
Vol 11 (12) ◽  
pp. 687
Author(s):  
Ildikó Sz. Kristóf

This is a historical anthropological study of a period of social and religious tensions in a Calvinist city in the Kingdom of Hungary in the first half of the 18th century. The last and greatest plague epidemic to devastate Hungary and Transylvania between cca. 1738 and 1743 led to a clash of different opinions and beliefs on the origin of the plague and ways of fighting it. Situated on the Great Hungarian Plain, the city of Debrecen saw not only frequent violations of the imposed lockdown measures among its inhabitants but also a major uprising in 1739. The author examines the historical sources (handwritten city records, written and printed regulations, criminal proceedings, and other documents) to be found in the Debrecen city archives, as well as the writings of the local Calvinist pastors published in the same town. The purpose of the study is to outline the main directions of interpretation concerning the plague and manifest in the urban uprising. According to the findings of the author, there was a stricter and chronologically earlier direction, more in keeping with local Puritanism in the second half of the 17th century, and there was also a more moderate and later one, more in line with the assumptions and expectations of late 18th-century medical science. While the former set of interpretations seems to have been founded especially on a so-called “internal” cure (i.e., religious piety and repentance), the latter proposed mostly “external” means (i.e., quarantine measures and herbal medicine) to avoid the plague and be rid of it. There seems to have existed, however, a third set of interpretations: that of folk beliefs and practices, i.e., sorcery and magic. According to the files, a number of so-called “wise women” also attempted to cure the plague-stricken by magical means. The third set of interpretations and their implied practices were not tolerated by either of the other two. The author provides a detailed micro-historical analysis of local events and the social and religious discourses into which they were embedded.


Urban Science ◽  
2021 ◽  
Vol 5 (2) ◽  
pp. 37
Author(s):  
Georgios-Rafail Kouklis ◽  
Athena Yiannakou

The purpose of this paper is to investigate the contribution of urban morphology to the formation of microclimatic conditions prevailing within urban outdoor spaces. We studied the compact form of a city and examined, at a detailed, street plan level, elements related to air temperature, urban ventilation, and the individual’s thermal comfort. All elements examined are directly affected by both the urban form and the availability of open and green spaces. The field study took place in a typical compact urban fabric of an old city center, the city center of Thessaloniki, where we investigated the relationship between urban morphology and microclimate. Urban morphology was gauged by examining the detailed street plan, along with the local building patterns. We used a simulation method based on the ENVI-met© software. The findings of the field study highlight the fact that the street layout, the urban canyon, and the open and green spaces in a compact urban form contribute decisively both to the creation of the microclimatic conditions and to the influence of the bioclimatic parameters.


2014 ◽  
Vol 31 (7-8) ◽  
pp. 267-271 ◽  
Author(s):  
Martin Parker

This short note considers the migration of the skyscraper from New York and Chicago to Asia and its absence in the emerging megacities of the Global South. Following 9/11, many commentators assumed that the skyscraper was finished, but this was clearly not the case, with super-tall construction now accelerating. However, the distributions of contemporary skyscrapers show us that there are shifts in global power and also in urban form.


Author(s):  
Washington Luiz Félix Correia Filho ◽  
José Francisco de Oliveira-Júnior ◽  
Carla Taciane Brasil dos Santos ◽  
Bárbara Alves Batista ◽  
Dimas de Barros Santiago ◽  
...  

2008 ◽  
Vol 33 (1) ◽  
pp. 72-85
Author(s):  
Fereshteh Habib ◽  
Ibrahim Numan ◽  
Hifsiye Pulhan

In casting a new look at city; this study interprets the urban form in respect of the role played by human perception of space. The main aim of this research at a macro level is to attain a strong theorical basis through a multi-dimensional approach to the city. The method of analyzing and carrying out a critique of it at an applied level will clarify the impact, which cultural factors have in the formation of urban form. This preliminary recognition and idealism is based on a hermeneutic and deductive method that is particular to the intellectual sciences In the process of devising theories, studying the urban planning texts related to the subject of study and the conclusion from the field study which is carried out in the Isfahan Naghshe Jahan square in the Safavy period played a key role in the research in addition to the goals and questions.


2018 ◽  
Author(s):  
Liam James Heaphy

The study of physical and social divisions in divided societies has long been an area of study, such as the continued usage of 'peace walls' in Belfast, hostile architecture to prevent anti-social behaviour and rough sleeping, and the securitisation of private spaces. In the context of a new drive to create a smart district, this paper looks at the relationship between smart urbanism and planning, and at the spatial and social divisions between a new 'gentrifying' and well-educated community in the Dublin Docklands and established communities in the area. The Dublin Docklands redevelopment marks a significant break from a pattern of suburbanisation and inner-city decline and repurposes part of the former port area as a city centre extension. The paper accounts for the reshaping of the Dublin Docklands as a ‘smart district’ in collaboration with the city authorities, based on over thirty semi-structured interviews and participant-observation at consultation events. It argues that reductive definitions of smart cities as networking technologies be reworked into broader considerations on urban technologies and the future of cities, with greater emphasis on the relationship between technologies branded as ‘smart’ and the material and digital manifestation of boundaries in urban form.


2021 ◽  
Vol 6 (2) ◽  
pp. 202-217 ◽  
Author(s):  
Safa H. Ashoub ◽  
Mohamed W. Elkhateeb

This article builds on theoretical foundations from enclave urbanism, authoritarian planning and neoliberal urbanisation to explore contemporary socio-spatial transformation(s) happening in Cairo, Egypt. Relying on a nationwide road development project, inner-city neighbourhoods in Cairo are turning into urban enclaves, whereby populations are being separated by a multiplicity of transport-related infrastructure projects. As these rapid planning processes are occurring, our article aims to explain why these developments are crucial and unique in the context of the post-Arab Spring cities. We argue that the new road infrastructure is creating a spatially and socially fragmented city and transforming the urban citizenry into a controllable and navigable body. We use an inductive approach to investigate the effects of the new road infrastructure and its hegemonic outcomes on the city. On a conceptual level, we propose that the enclaving of the city is a containment method that has erupted since the mass mobilisations of the Arab Spring. In doing so, we use qualitative analysis to explain empirical evidence showing how the city is being transformed into nodes of enclaves, where communities are getting separated from one another via socio-spatial fault lines.


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