• Author / Uploaded
• DylanOSullivan

Citation preview

Urban Problems & Solutions - São Paulo Introduction: 1. The Brazilian Government has made attempts to overcome the problems associated with the rapid urban growth of São Paulo. 2. The city’s rapid urban growth, now a megacity of over 22 million people, has occurred because of inward migration from the countryside for work and of the high birth rates. 3. This urban growth has caused two major problems, the growth of favelas and traffic congestion.

Growth of Favelas: 1. São Paulo has been unable to meet the housing demands of the rising population and this has resulted in the development of over 16,000 shantytowns where 20% of the population live. 2. While certain favelas, such as Cingapura and Monte Azul, have been supplied with basic water and electricity services, the Brazilian government has yet to only deal with a fraction of the favela communities in São Paulo. 3. It is difficult for the authorities to provide services, such as sewerage, waste, electricity and water, to many favela settlements because of their inaccessible geographical location. 4. Favelas are often forcibly moved by wealthy landowners, resulting in favelas developing on such difficult locations as hill slopes, areas prone to flooding and landfill sites. 5. As the favela communities have grown, favela removal by the authorities has given way to favela upgrade and during President Lula’s term in office, 2002-2010, huge advancements have been made in this regard. 6. The city council of São Paulo has also initiated self-help schemes to improve favela conditions by providing community centres, brick-built housing, school buildings and public sanitation services.

7. São Paulo’s largest favela, Paraisopolis, with 60,000 inhabitants is one region where the majority of houses are now brick-built, but there is still no waste system in place.

Traffic Congestion: 1. The Brazilian authorities have had to take numerous steps in overcoming the problem of traffic congestion in São Paulo as the region has more than 6 million cars as well as trucks and delivery vans, and without any ring roads, all traffic has to go through the city. 2. The Mario Covas Beltway is a 177km ring road currently being built around the city of São Paulo in Brazil in order to minimise this congestion in the city centre. 3. Traffic flows are interrupted for an average of four hours a day and one on particular occasion on May 9th 2008, 266km of traffic was at a standstill on São Paulo’s streets. 4. Similar to the programme in Singapore, the Brazilian authorities implemented a rota system, the “Rodizio”, prohibiting drivers from using their cars one day a week. 5. Transport in São Paulo is overwhelmingly road based, accounting for 97% of travel compared with 2.2% air and less than 1% rail. 6. In order to combat this, the São Paulo metro system has been upgraded from three to five lines and now has 64 stations, increasing daily ridership to 299,000. 7. Another traffic management project in São Paulo involves the private implementation “trunkline bus corridors” in order to increase bus transport efficiency and usage, thus getting cars of the roads.