Toon: day by day impressions and conclusion

Day 1

Cantinho de Céu, Parque Cidade Jardim

The park project could potentially be interesting. The success of these kinds of initiatives depends highly on participation by locals and maintenance. I wonder if this is thought through.

What fascinates me more is the urban agriculture, the informal market starts here. Exploiting the land at low costs for agriculture seems a win-win situation. The electricity company has a guarantee their land does not get squatted and is to a certain degree taken care of; the users of the land have a small income through farming. Anti-squatting policy, love it. I am disappointed not to see more similar initiatives.

What big a contrast did we see later at the shopping mall. It is deserted. It does not appeal to me at all. There are far more employees than costumers. Most of the shops are chains, selling large international brands.

Day 2

Paraisopolis, Jardim Pantanal

I am not surprised about the favela. If anything I expected them to be poorer and more crowded. There seem to be not too many people on the street on Tuesday morning. As we drive out of Paraisopolis the traffic and crowdiness increases. School is out. There is a very clear urban structure, a grid. I miss the narrow small streets and the economy aspect is formalized. There are shops instead of market stands, counsellors, you can pay with your credit card.

Jardim Pantanal is different. There is more space. The streets are wider, the houses are larger and all have a garden. Economic activity is not consuming, but on producing. If Paraisopolis is the city, the Jardim Pantanal is the village. I appreciate the local initiatives to educate the residents. The cultural aspect (local music and crafts) is immensely important. It helps building up a community. Am I falsely justifying informality?

Day 3

Lecture Maira Acayaba, visit Alphaville

The photography presentation is hard to see on the projector screen. It is hard to judge the images. Even though, I am very happy to see that people can access parts of the city at night.

On our way to Alphaville we pass the highway running straight through São Paulo, the snake, am I right? Maira tells me that on Sundays the road is blocked for cars and used for leisure. I feel like running. At night I see people running on Avenida Paulista. I had expected more places where you can play sports.

Now all the places where you can play sports are gated, like Alphaville. Alphaville is like a French holiday resort, but then with bigger houses. The only people I see are employees cleaning the driveways and gardeners.

Day 4

SEHAB lectures, visit to Praça José Luis de Mello Malhei

The lectures are, in my opinion, not too interesting. It seems to mee that São Paulo is too big for just one organization to build social housing. If you try to solve the problem of bad conditions in informal settlements with social housing, you will need much more. My thought is that SEHAB needs to first solve the problem of quantity by building basic housing, but housing with a high potential. Keep options open for developing quality and involve the residents. I think top down planning will be very hard. The new building designed by the architecture office provides 200 people with better housing, but you will loose the other 500 that need to move out of sight.

The visit to the neighbourhood near Estudantes is quite interesting. The city needs these kinds of spaces. It keeps local social workers in touch with the lower class of society. The garbage collection is another form of an informal economy, but opposed to the urban agriculture, this seems to have a rather negative connotation.

Conclusion

My general impression of São Paulo over the last week is rather positive. I expected the city to be much more crowded. People are quite relaxed. Culturally this is the biggest difference with European countries. The urban phenomena in the city are similar. I think culturally the difference with the United States is bigger, even though Brasil is not considered part of the western civilization. Architecturally the São Paulo tends to be more like the United States.

Economically the city does have a problem. There simply is not enough money to provide for sufficient housing and fair living conditions for everyone. So I think architects should be looking for low cost solutions, in which local participation is the most important key word.