Curitiba Curitiba is one of the world’s most sustainable cities. Sustainable urban development has flourished in Curitiba more than anywhere else in Brazil. The city is average in size, located in eastern Brazil approximately 1,000 km south of Rio de Janeiro. Jamie Lerner is recognized as a driving force behind Curitiba's success. Mayor and architect in the late 1960s, Lerner planned to develop the city focusing on pedestrian traffic, limiting urban sprawl, and creating an effective public transportation system. He looked for ways to reduce use of natural resources, as well as to reuse and recycle products in the market. Lerner believed that people matter more than economics when planning cities. His ideas transformed Curitiba from a place for processing agricultural products into an industrial powerhouse by means of connecting economic and social activities. According to Lerner, political will and citizen participation are necessary to make changes that result in a successful city. One outstanding sustainable practice in Curitiba is their advanced garbage and recycling management. Curitiba was one of the first places to start citywide garbage management in the world in the late 1980s. The people start the process by separating their trash into inorganic and organic waste. Then there are teams coordinated in different colored uniforms and trucks that come around and collect the garbage from the street. Cans, glass, plastics and papers are all collected and recycled. All of the trash is separated in a plant where bundles of like materials are stacked and eventually shipped off to be melted down and molded into a new product. This reuse of waste cuts production costs of goods dramatically. Curitiba recycles nearly ⅔ of its garbage. They take books out of the trash and put them in libraries for the citizens to enjoy. When ancient artifacts or valuable items are found in the garbage, they are recovered and put into town museums. My favorite part about Curitiba’s garbage management is their green exchange program. Citizens who live down narrow streets where the garbage collection trucks cannot reach are encouraged to bring their garbage and recyclables out themselves. When they come to the green exchange centers, they turn in their trash for fresh produce or bus tickets. The area around Curitiba produces surplus agricultural products that would normally go to waste, so instead the city uses them as an initiative to get people’s trash where it belongs. This helps keep the city clean, allows the government to save money by not widening back roads, it uses up food that would otherwise be wasted, encourages citizens to use public transportation and while doing all of that, there is a sense of community and encounter. Curitiba is sustainable also due to its rainwater management system. Built on a plateau, Curitiba was spending millions of dollars in an attempt to redirect runoff. The city built a network of greenbelts, lakes and city parks along natural waterways. The parks make Curitiba more environmentally friendly, and they provide green space which has been proven to benefit human health and well being. The riverbanks that ran through Curitiba were turned into parks. Trees were planted to help absorb rainwater. Excess water from the rainy season is directed into lakes to prevent flooding while simultaneously creating a picture landscape for citizens to enjoy. Old factories that were no longer in use were turned into sports facilities, and outdoor exercise areas were built to help initiate recreation in the parks. The most impressive aspect of Curitiba is the layout of the streets combined with the public transportation system. The automobile is looked down upon as a source of transportation in cities because each only carries one or two people and always requires more infrastructure, which gets to be very demanding. The bus carries 300 brazilians. There are three million people in the metropolitan area, 1,800,000 people in the city itself. The city's integrated transport system busses move people quickly and cheaply. There are five main roads through the city, the middle road reserved for busses only. There are separate busses that bring people from outside the city to one of the five express roots. There are then busses that link suburbs outside the center of the city to the express roots. Grey busses pick up everywhere in between and make many more stops. Congestion is usually an issue in cities but that is not the case in Curitiba. Curitiba could not afford to build a subway, so instead it developed a way of transporting people above ground that is 500 times cheaper. Each bus carries up to 4000 passengers each day and on average these busses move 70% of the population every day. There are little tubes where people enter and exit the busses. These tubes are key in the system as they provide a safe place to board and exit the bus, they are handicap friendly, citizens pay there instead of paying the bus driver who would regularly idle while dealing with payment, increasing the amount of carbon emissions released into the atmosphere. The details behind the main transportation system are equally as amazing. Bus companies are paid by number of kilometers they travel rather than number of passengers. This leads to equal coverage of all areas and eliminates competing for routes with the most passengers. The use of busses in place of automobile has allowed Curitiba to have the lowest rates of air pollution in Brazil. They also have a lower per capita fuel consumption which is shocking considering the business of the city is mostly heavy manufacturing. The busses themselves are manufactured in the city. Volvo designed and built the 25 meter long bi articulated bus in 1992. Volvo decided to set up in Curitiba due to its relatively highly educated work force. The transit system also employs many people in the city. Putting electronic sensors on bus routes years ago helped traffic move and also helped to identify areas of safety concerns. That information was used to change intersection designs and transit routes to save lives. Sensors embedded in the express lanes today track all bus movements. The traffic control center receives a steady flow of information from the sensors which allows operators to clear intersections by stopping car traffic to allow buses through. Curitiba is solving its urban design problems by thinking of the city as a whole system. By linking the information networks that service the city, it has developed as a living organism, responsive to change, and capable of rapid adaptation. Bus stops become nodes on a network filled with essential activities like shopping, businesses, police and recreation. The city was started on the idea that a city is a place of encounter achieving together what people cannot achieve alone. Lerner’s belief was that streets should be the heart of the shopping industry. He pushed for a regular street in the middle of the city to be turned into a pedestrian shopping mall within 72 hours. Merchants were unhappy at first, threatening to drive their vehicles right through it. To avoid this, the planners laid down paper and paint in the streets for kids to paint. To this day, every saturday paper is laid down to paint, and people interact with each other regardless of class, race, or religion. Accepting and enjoying cultural contrasts in the city are key in its success. Creating culturally themed spaces such as an Italian portal, a Ukrainian park, the Polish park, the Japanese square, or the German park help people to feel connected and accepted in the community. In Curitiba, the library in each area is specialized for their surrounding neighborhoods. Local knowledge in the libraries combined with a global network such as the internet allow for students to grow. The history and pride of the city must also be maintained in order for people to feel as though they belong. Putting out information about the history of the city, if a family was having a reunion, a street having a fair, they could put out a newspaper of history to new people to make them a part of the community. The idea of establishing libraries as the core of a community is used in the city as well. The libraries are designed with a lighthouse in each one. A lighthouse of learning is symbolic, and incorporating technology in them makes the effect even more powerful. Computer access for residents allows for better communication as well as greater access to the web and more books. Busses that were no longer in use have been filled with computers and transformed into a type of mobile school. These busses visit different neighborhoods and educate people on all sorts of topics ranging from electric literacy to sewing. Curitibas future challenge is to deal with their own success. Transit has reached a high level of success but now it may be hard to fit everyone on busses as the city grows. Lerner says that the city is not a problem, but the solution. He believes that cities are a solution to climate change. Lerner keeps an optimistic approach to cities, declaring that every city can be improved in three years regardless of scale or financial resources. He stresses the idea that a city must be a place of encounter, where working and living collide seamlessly. Lerner explains that sustainability in a city (all the ideas about how to transform old quarries and open universities and botanic gardens) is related to what we teach the children. By teaching Curitiban children how to separate garbage, they have taught their parents and now 70 percent of garbage is taken care of properly. Overall, sustainability in a city, especially one like Curitiba, is a process of trial and error that will take a lot of planning and effort. Cities must have multiple use buildings, which can be tricky to design. Making slight changes and observing how the public reacts is the best way to mold a community. Lerner points out that lacking money in a budget can be more helpful than hurtful. Having limited funds when planning a city can stimulate more creativity of urban planning. Proposing new sustainable materials and working toward one goal at a time helped to make Curitiba successful. Continually proposing new sustainable materials and trying out new plans will ensure that the city continues to succeed.