2 forwarded messages: Curatiba

From: L Steele <lsteele.employee.msvu@msvu1.msvu.ca>
To: sust-mar@chebucto.ns.ca
Date: Wed, 10 May 2000 10:23:00 -0300
Precedence: bulk
Return-Path: <sust-mar-mml-owner@chebucto.ns.ca>

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2 messages on Curatabia: from Leighton Steele & "Acid" Wayne Groszko
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Here is a message which I sent to a few people and which Paul asked me
to forward to the group.
______________________________________________________________
Have any of you heard about this city of 2.5
million people in Brazil named
Curatiba? Its sounds like a kind of miracle: a
public-transit friendly,
car-unfriendly place that is functioning
pretty well. I only heard about it for
the first time the other day on CKDU, the
"Barsamian Tapes" in a report by Bill
McKibben, a journalist and author (who
basically is responsible for spreading
the word about global warming). Anyhow, I am
interested in finding out more and
am ordering the transcipt of that particular
broadcast. But, here is a website
with some minimal info about the place...

http://www.curitiba.pr.gov.br/Ingles/Cidade/Historia/index.html

--
Leighton (Larry) Steele
Modern Languages Dept.
Mount Saint Vincent University
Phone : 457-6113
Fax : 425-0901

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From:	Wayne Groszko <groszko@Atm.Dal.Ca>

This may be of interest to sustainable maritimers...

Wayne Groszko                   groszko@atm.dal.ca

> On Tue, 9 May 2000, Wayne Groszko wrote:
> > 
> > Hi Larry,
> > Yes, I have heard of Curitiba. In fact, a city planner from Curitiba came
> > to speak in Halifax at the Daltech planning seminar in the spring of 1999,
> > and I saw her presentation. It was really interesting. They have planned
> > their city around five "arms", and each arm has "dedicated busway" (buses
> > only), in the middle, with streets for cars on the outside, and a
> > boulevard in between. This is the main transit network, and it's used by
> > so many people that the buses are "double-articulated" (they are each
> > three buses long, with two folds in the middle for turning.) Each bus can
> > carry 280 passengers. It's essentially a train on rubber tires. The bus
> > stops are more like little station platforms, so you get your ticket
> > before you get on. This speeds up service.
> > 
> > The land use of the city is planned accordingly. High density housing,
> > like apartment buildings, is concentrated along the arms so people can
> > walk to transit. Lower density communities are located in between the
> > arms.
> > 
> > There is a big car-free zone in the middle of the city, on what used to be
> > a main road for cars.
> > 
> > There are several hundred kilometres of bike paths.
> > 
> > There is all kinds of other neat stuff, like public libraries all over the
> > place, built as replicas of the Library of Alexandria, with a domed
> > lighthouse on top so they can be clearly identified (beacon of knowledge
> > thing...). There is a "free university" for people to upgrade their
> > knowledge. One part of the city is designed as a "crafts village", with
> > houses that have a small shop/studio on the ground floor, and an apartment
> > on the second floor, so that people can start their own small businesses
> > right in their house - bike repair shop, cookie store, you name it.
> > 
> > How did all this happen? My understanding of what she said is that it
> > started like a kind of "benign dictatorship". A few decades ago, the state
> > governor decreed - it shall be so! The main street downtown was turned
> > into a pedestrian mall in a single weekend, on the governor's orders, and
> > things have kind of evolved from there.
> > 
> > It is a university town, with (I think), the oldest university in Brazil.
> > 
> > happy days,
> > Wayne Groszko                   groszko@atm.dal.ca



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The preceding message was posted on the Sustainable Maritimes
mailing list (sust-mar).  http://www.chebucto.ns.ca/lists/sust-mar
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