A city that was completely transformed by the strong will of civic leaders and innovative urban planning strategies.

Many people attribute the birth of Curitiba, Brazil’s innovative urban planning to a night in 1972 when Mayor Jaime Lerner held the bulldozers at bay.  Plans called for the construction of an overpass through the historic Rua Quinze de Novembro [Route of November 15].  On the eve of demolition, under the cover of darkness, the mayor ordered concrete planters and barricades put in place, turning the street into a pedestrian mall.  The next morning, when angry motorists threatened to stage a protest, the mayor unrolled reams of butcher paper and invited hundreds of children to color in the plaza.  Today no overpass splits the historic district.

Lerner’s pedestrian mall actually reflects a master plan first outlined in the mid-1960s by a group of architects and urban planners at the Federal University of Parana.  The plan proposed defining linear corridors that link industrial areas with housing, recreational centers, and green areas.  Less than thirty years after Lerner halted the bulldozers, Curitiba’s the city’s disparate corridors are fused. 

The population of Curitiba has doubled and yet traffic has declined by 30 percent due, in part, to the city’s commitment to public buses.  Curitiba designated several main roadways as structural axes for bus-ways, and created multiple bus-only lanes.  Large bus shelters and transfer stations were constructed with an eye towards aesthetics. One uniform fare is applied to all-length trips.  The city also entered into a public-private partnership with bus companies. The city maintains the roads and bridges and provides street lighting; the companies schedule routes and provide vehicles and employ drivers.  The companies convert the old buses to mobile classes for mechanical, business, and artisan courses.

Curitiba built an industrial city of 400 companies on the city’s edge—near the shanties on the outskirts of town—and scheduled bus routes linking the companies to the housing. In some poorer neighborhoods, a program called Citizenship Streets provided access to business loans, training, and job opportunities. A Technology Village demonstrates a variety of innovative low-cost housing methods that allow families to live and work in the same neighborhood.

Curitiba also initiated systems to enhance the natural environment near the city. City officials encourage tree planting. Parks have been constructed. City building and development codes steer growth away from environmentally sensitive areas.  The cith has established 1000 plazas to increase the amount of open space from five feet per person in 1970, to 559 feet today.  Curitiba comprises thirteen municipalities and a considerable effort was required to achieve consensus among different constituencies.  The city’s commitment to confining growth to corridors along the bus ways and away from sensitive environmental areas, Curitiba has achieved growth without destroying nature.