Urban planning of Curitiba, Brazil. How is their current situation, their impact on environment, their techniques and policies used for the planning, past Curitiba... *Compiled this for some1 who requested an assistance.

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URBAN PLANNING OF CUITIBA, BRAZIL
INTRODUCTION
Curitiba is the capital and largest city of the Brazilian state of Parana. , she has
emerged as one of the most important example of creative urban planning of the
world. Indeed, this city has known a rapid growth, the city's population numbered
approximately 1,879,355 people as of 2015, making it the eighth most populous city
in the country, and the largest in Brazil's South Region. The Curitiba Metropolitan
area comprises 26 municipalities with a total population of over 3.2 million (IBGE
estimate in 2010), making it the seventh most populous in the country.
Curitiba is an important cultural, political, and economic center in Latin America.
The city sits on a plateau at 932 meters (3,058 ft.) above sea level. In the 1700s
Curitiba possessed a favorable location between cattle-breeding country and
marketplaces, leading to a successful cattle trade and the city's first major expansion.
Later, between 1850 and 1950, it grew due to logging and agricultural expansion in
the Parana State (first Araucaria logging, later mate and coffee cultivation and in the
1970s wheat, corn and soybean cultivation). In the 1850s waves of European
immigrants arrived in Curitiba, mainly Germans, Italians, Poles and Ukrainians,

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contributing to the city's economic and cultural development. Nowadays, only smaller
numbers of foreign immigrants arrive, primarily from Middle Eastern and other South
American countries.
The biggest expansion occurred after the 1960s, with innovative urban planning that
changed the population size from some hundreds of thousands to more than a million
people. Architects and Urbanists, whose Jaime Lerner, proposed a plan with the idea
of a liveable and sustainable environment for residents of the city. At that time many
questions are topical in nearby cities like: automobile, pollution, important crime rate
and a low educational level. But we will see that Curitiba has taken a particular path
of urban planning, which permits her a good development
Why did Curitiba succeeded where others have faltered?

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DESIGNING WITH NATURE
This city has promoted a development with a preference for public transportation than
for private automobile, and proposed to work with the environment rather than
against it. These ideas grown from the 1960 to 1971 when the master plan was drawn.
One of the first successes of Curitiba was controlling some environmental problems
which damaged the city centre during late 1950’s : flooding.
Some civil engineers proposed solutions to drain this water with underground canals.
In the same time, this makes it possible to create some artificial lakes thanks to
riverbanks turned into parks. Buses and bicycle paths were included into these
gardens in order attract people to use them.
We can note a raise of green space from half a square meter per capita in 1970, to 50
in 1996.
Bicycle path in one of the city’s park
(Scientific American revue)
A park in Curitiba (wordpress.com)

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PRIORITY TO PUBLIC TRANSPORT
The second success of Curitiba, and probably the most important, was her research
concerning public transports. This city hasn’t any problem of circulation because
there isn’t a concentric grown, as we can see in most of others cities at this time.
Indeed, Curitiba is then consists of five main axis which the city is built around.
Skyscrapers are allowed along the road, and further away the density is lighter, urban
sprawl is then limited and the city development controlled.
Each of the five axes consists of three parallel roadways. The central road contains
two express bus lanes; this road is dedicated to buses only in order to be faster. And
the two others are dedicated to cars.
1966: extension belong 5 axes
1971: public transportation plan is achieved
Curitiba’s transit
(Scientific American revue)

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INTEGRATED DESIGN MAKES BUSWAYS WORK
The express bus system is designed as a single entity. Some specials raised-tube bus-
stops are created to invite people to pay before to enter the bus, this will improve
traffic flow, and from now on buses just have to stop a few times, and can quickly
continue the path.
The choice of an «outside subway» has allowed to Curitiba to save money. Indeed, if
a subway as we can know was grown, it should be much more expensive.
This integrated design is very effective, more and more people are using this transport
means, so some new buses are created in 1992 : bi-articulated buses, they can
received 270 passengers, so more than three times as many as an ordinary bus.
(a) Raised-tube bus-stops (by Jonas
Rabinovitch)
(b) Evolution of Curitiba's buses
(Scientific American revue)

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PARTICIPATION THROUGH INCENTIVES
Another important point of the success is the process by incentives. The first one is to
protect the historical centre; the plan suggests building elsewhere in order to preserve
old buildings of this part of the city. Many streets of this district have been converted
in pedestrian streets, reducing pollution and fostering a sense of neighbourhood.
The second incentive concerns the recycling. In that time, recycling in Curitiba
appears in many forms:
 sort
 Second life for buses
 reconversion of old electricity poles in public offices and park buildings
All these innovations permitted to reduce the cost and increased the effectiveness of
city’s waste management system, job opportunities and provided benefits as follows
The benefits of the systems are as follows:
 Reduced transportation time: the per capita income loss due to severe
congestion is ~11 and 7 times lower than in Sao Paulo and Rio de Janeiro,
respectively
 The creation of the CIC has created about 50,000 direct jobs and 150,000
indirect jobs, and about 20% of the state's exports are from the CIC
 Curitiba's fuel usage is 3% lower than in Brazil's other major cities;
 Improved outdoor air quality and associated health benefits
 70% of the city's residents are actively recycling and 13% of solid waste is
recycled
 Property values of neighboring areas has appreciated, and tax revenues have
increased
 Reduced flood mitigation expenditures by promotion of park development in
flood-prone areas (the cost of this strategy is estimated to be 5% lower than
building concrete canals).

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LESSONS FOR AN URBANIZING WORLD
For this city, Curitiba, all the conditions were here to make a good planning:
 geographic conditions
 economic conditions
 political conditions
Nevertheless, even if cities haven’t these criteria, Curitiba’s planning should be an
example for three important points:
 TRANSPORTATION: the priority should be given to public transports rather
to private cars, and to pedestrians rather to motorized vehicles,
 CONNECTED SYSTEM: to propose a global solution taking care to all actors
of the planning,
 TRANSFORM PROBLEMS LIKE RESSOURCES: usual problems are here
used for generate new resources (public transport, urban solid waste,
unemployment).
After the example of Curitiba, others cities adopted the same urbanization, especially
in Brazil and Latin America.

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CONCLUSION
The Curitiba metropolitan area developed its economic strategy in the late 1960s and
early 1970s by tackling its growing population and transportation problems in a
creative and cost-effective way. Over the years, social programs such as the Jobs
Route, Green Exchange, and Citizenship Streets, have taken advantage of the
transportation system by using old buses as classrooms and organizing activities
around bus terminals. These programs were organized by the local planning
organization, the IPPUC, and other public and private leaders because they
understood that the fundamental asset that Curitiba relies on to attract and build a
skilled labor force and economically strong businesses are its high quality of life. The
main industry networks in the region –automotive manufacturing, communications
software, infrastructure, and tourism, have benefited from Curitiba’s various urban
improvements like the Industrial District and the Software Park.
While different metropolitan areas have different assets to cultivate, Curitiba can
offer an example of a successful way to harness those assets and use them to grow
Competitive industry networks. A common reaction to Curitiba’s environmentally
oriented approach to urban development is that it would not work in the largest of
cities. Jaime Lerner’s response to such remarks is, “to agree that the city is different -
but this is because it has made itself different: all cities (including mega-cities) could
follow its Example.”
“I hold great store in the 'domino effect', believing that the example of one city - good
or bad - can influence the rest. Countries can be changed by their cities and I
emphatically believe in an optimistic vision of both the city and humanity. If the city
becomes environmentally friendly, the country will follow suit and future generations
will inherit a world in which development is sustainable.”