SETTLEMENT EVOLUTION

A case of Brasilia

SUBMITTED TO: SUBMITTED BY:

Ms. Vijaya Kumari, Krishna Chand CH,
Faculty, JNAFAU. M.Tech, First sem.

Cities are not just brick and mortar; they represent the
dreams, aspirations and hopes of societies. In a way, each city
has its own personality, with its strengths and weaknesses,
 Introduction:
Brasilia is the capital of Brazil

Braslia often refers to the Distrito Federal (Federal District),

Area of federal district is of 5,802 sq.m.

Climate is Tropical savannah climate and the average

temperature is 20.5 C (68.9 F).

The population of Brasilian federal district is of 26,06,885.

Population density was 435.98 inhabitants per square
kilometre. (According to IBGE 2009 census)

Brasilia is the largest city (by population) in the world at the

close of the 20th century that didn't exist at the beginning of
the century.

The Human Development Index in the city is at 0.936 in

the year 2000, (developed nation level), and the illiteracy rate
is around 4.35%.

Brasilia is listed as a World Heritage Site by UNESCO.

The city is a world reference for urban planning.

SETTLEMENT EVOLUTION - A CASE OF BRASILIA

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 History:
The first republican constitution of 1891 reserved a 14,400 sq.km. area for the future capital.

In 1956 President Kubitschek created a development corporation for the new capital.

In International design competition, Lusio Costa won the contest

and was the main urban planner.

Architect Oscar Niemeyer was given the charge of designing

all public buildings.

The capital city was built with unprecedented speed in 41 months. Mr. Lusio Costa Mr. Oscar Niemeyer

From the beginning, the growth of Braslia was greater than original estimates. Several satellite cities

have been created over the years to house the extra inhabitants.

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 The City Plan as presented by Lucio Costa in 1957:

The city should be planned for orderly and efficient work, but, at the same time, be both vital
and pleasing, suitable for reverie and intellectual speculation, it should be such a city as, with
time, could become not only the seat of government and administration, but also one of the
more lucid and distinguished cultural centers in the country.

Having made these preliminary remarks, let us now consider how the present
solution was born, took shape and resolved itself:

1 - Basically, it was born of the primary gesture of one who marks or takes
possession of a place: two axes crossing at right-angles; The very sign of the
Cross

2 - It was then sought to adapt this sign to the local topography, the natural drainage of the area, to
the best possible orientation;

SETTLEMENT EVOLUTION - A CASE OF BRASILIA

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 3 - To apply to the technique of town planning the free principles of
highway engineering, including the elimination of intersections, was
made into a thorough radial artery, with fast central lanes and side
lanes for local traffic. Along this axis, the bulk of the residential districts
(super blocks) have been placed (Fig. 3).

This is the most important

expressway in Braslia and is called as
Eixao. Eixo is the pair of roads in the
middle. In parallel to the Eixo, at both
sides, there are the Eixinhos (small
axes), which give access to the
residentialblocks.

There is no traffic light along the

Eixo, but in some points speed
controllers were installed. buses do
not go along the Eixo; most buses
go along W3, another expressway
which serves most commercial and
residential blocks of Braslia.

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 4 - As a consequence of this residential concentration, the civic and administrative
centers, the cultural, entertainment and sporting centers, the municipal
administration facilities, the barracks, the storage and supply zones, the sites for
small local industries, and the railway station, naturally fell into place along the
transverse axis, which thus became the monumental axis of the system.

Alongside the intersection of the axes,

but appertaining functionally and in terms of
urbanistic composition to the monumental
axis, the banking and commercial
districts have been placed, as well as the
The Monumental Axis
offices for private business and the liberal 1.Congress Complex
professions, and the ample areas set aside 2.Supreme Court
3.Planalto Palace
for retail trade. 4.Plaza of Three Powers
5.Ministry of Foreign Relations
6.Ministry buildings
7.Cathedral 8.Theatre
9.Main Traffic Interchange

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 5 - The intersection of the monument and the highway-residential axes, the former being on a lower level,
called for the creation of a broad platform where only parking and local traffic would be permitted, and
which logically suggested the location of the entertainment centre for the city, with the cinemas, theatres,
restaurants, etc. (Fig. 5).

6 - Thorough traffic to other sectors passes along the lower ground level under the platform, in one way
lanes, the platform being closed at its ends but open on the two broader sides; most of this covered area
is used for parking, and the inter-urban bus station has been placed there and is accessible to
passengers from the upper level of the platform.

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 Let us now see how the various districts of the city are integrated and articulated within this
framework of orderly circulation:
The most outstanding buildings are those which will house the fundamental powers, and because these
are three in number, and autonomous, the equilateral triangle seemed the elementary form most
appropriate to enclose them;

One of the buildings was placed at each angle of this plaza - Plaza of the
Three Powers as it might well be called - with Government House and the
Supreme Court occupying the base of the triangle and Congress at the apex.

The latter faces a broad

esplanade, rectangular in shape
and on a higher level in
accordance with the local
topography. The application of
this ancient oriental terrace
technique, in modern terms,
ensures the cohesion of the
project as a whole and lends it
unexpected monumental strength.

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 Along this esplanade - broad sweeping lawns to be used by pedestrians, and parades - the various
ministries and autonomous agencies were placed (Fig. 10). Suitably fitted to their frame, the ministries of
Foreign Affairs and Justice occupy the lower corners near the House of Congress.

The last in the line is the Ministry of Education, so that it stands adjacent to
the cultural area for which a park solution has been used, the better to frame
the museums, library, planetarium, academies and institutes etc.

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 This sector in turn borders the broad area reserved for University with its General Hospital.

The Cathedral has a plaza of its own disposed laterally not so much for reasons of protocol, since the
Church is separate from the State.

For reasons of architectonics: the perspective of the esplanade as a whole must run unimpeded
beyond the intersection of the two main axes.

University

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 Placed laterally to this central entertainment district, there are two great nuclei reservednas shopping
centres, and two other areas, one reserved for the banking and commercial enterprises and the other as
office space. In the former the Bank of Brazil, and in the later the Central Post Office and Telegraph building
are accommodated.

The sports district has been located between the

Municipal plaza and the radio transmitter tower.

On one side is the stadium with its

dependencies, and beyond it the
Botanical Gardens; On the other is
the race course with its stands and
riding club, and the Zoological
Gardens beyond.

These two vast green spaces, symmetrically laid out in relation to the City's monumental axis, will serve
as the new city's "lungs.

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 In the Municipal plaza were sited
the Town Hall, Police Headquarters,
the Fire Brigade and the Public
Welfare Building; a prison and an
asylum are also part of this district,
though set at some distance from the
urbanized core.

Beyond the municipal sector space

was set aside for the garages of the
city's public transport system, beyond
them on both sides lie the military
barracks, and a broad transversal strip
reserved for small local industries
completes the sector.

Having run the length of city's monumental axis, it can

be seen that the fluency and unity of the layout from the
Government Plaza at one end to the Municipal plaza at
the other does not preclude variety, and that each sector
forms what we might call an autonomous plastic unit within
the whole. This autonomy creates spaciousness on a noble
scale, and permits the appreciation of each unit's individual
qualities without adversely affecting their harmonious
integration in the urban whole.

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 The solution envisaged for the residential problem calls for a continuous sequence of large blocks set
in double or single line along both sides of the residential highway axis, each surrounded by bands of
greenery planted with trees.

This layout has the double advantage of guaranteeing

orderly urbanization even where the density, type, pattern or
architectonic quality of the buildings varies, and of giving the
inhabitants tree-lined strips in which to walk or take leisure,
other than the open spaces foreseen within the blocks
themselves.

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 Within these "superblocks" the residential buildings could be arranged in many and varying manners,
always provided that two general principles are observed: uniform height regulations, possibly six
stories raised on pillars, and separation of motor and pedestrian traffic.

On the far side of the blocks

runs the service street for heavy
vehicles, and a strip along the
other side of that highway is
reserved for the installation of
garages, repair shops, wholesale
warehouses, etc.

The churches, secondary

schools and retail stores have
been placed on broad strips
which join the service and
residential axis highways at
intervals.

The local Church has been placed where four blocks meet, and
behind it are the secondary schools, while the cinema has been
placed on the section of the service strip facing the highway to
make it easily accessible from other districts;

SETTLEMENT EVOLUTION - A CASE OF BRASILIA

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 Social gradations can easily be regulated by giving a higher value to the single blocks bordering on the
embassy district. Along the residential highway axis, the blocks closer to the highway will naturally be
valued more highly than the inner blocks, which will permit gradations inherent to the economic
system.

Nevertheless, the grouping of the superblocks in sets of four will favour a certain degree of social
co-existence, avoiding undue and undesirable class distinctions.

Furthermore, differences in standards between one block and another will be of such a nature as
not to affect the comforts to which all are entitled. Such differences will be the result of a greater or
lesser density, of more or less space allocated to each individual and each family, and of the choice of
building materials and quality of the finishing.

In this connection it is very important to avoid the mushrooming of hovels either in the urban or the
rural areas;

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 Isolated residential districts have
also been planned, surrounded by
trees and open countryside, to be of
saw-toothed lots.

By placing the cemeteries at the

ends of the residential highway
axis, funeral processions will not need
to cross the urban center. These
cemeteries will be landscaped with
lawns and suitable trees.

Using the lakefront as a site to preserve its beauty intact,

landscaping it with woods and fields in a natural and rustic
manner, so that the urban population can enjoy its simple
pleasures. Only athletic clubs, restaurants, places of
entertainment, beach resorts and fishing groups may be built on
the shoreline water's edge.

Conlusion of concept:
To sum up, the solution presented is easy to understand, for it is characterized by the simplicity and clarity
of the original design - which however does not exclude variety in the treatment of the component parts, as
has already been shown. Each component has been conceived according to the nature of the function
involved, and thus creating harmony between apparently contradictory needs. Thus, while monumental, the
city is also comfortable, efficient, welcoming and intimate. It is at the same time spacious and neat, rustic
and urban, lyrical and functional.

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 Relation to Athens Charter:
CIAM remained the most important forum for the international exchange of ideas on modern
architecture. Brazil was represented in the congress as early as 1930, and Brasilias architects Lusio
Costa and Oscar Niemeyer have practiced its tenets with renowned clarity.
Braslia is known internationally for having applied the principles in the Athens Charter of 1933.

The Athens Charter, defines the objectives of city planning in terms of the four functions. The keys to
city planning are to be found in four functions: housing, work, recreation (during leisure) and traffic. The
theme of Athens Charter would be the Functional City, that is, one where land planning would be
based upon function-based zones.
The last function, traffic, brings the other three usefully into
HOUSING communication. A later CIAM meeting augmented the four to five to include
a public core of administrative and civic functions.
Thus, together with the circulation, zoning determines both the internal
WORK organisation and the overall shape of the CIAM model city.
The plan of Brasilia is the perfect illustration of how the zoning of these
functions can generate a city. A circulation cross of speed ways determines
the organization and shape of the city exactly as Le Corbusier, the guiding
RECREATION hand of CIAM proposes in an earlier publication: Running north and south,
and east and west, and forming the great axes of the city, there would be
great arterial roads for fast one way traffic.
Residential super blocks are placed along one axes; work along the other.
TRAFFIC The public core is located to one side of the axial crossing. Recreation in the
form of lake and green belt surrounds the city.

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 Positive aspects:
The city has been acclaimed for its use of modernist architecture on a grand scale and for its utopian city
plan. The city's planned design included specific areas for almost everything.

Design for Brasilia brilliantly bound together the symbolic conception of the modern and ancient city.

Braslia was planned to have smooth transit flow.

Although not fully accomplished, the "Brazilian utopia" has produced a city of relatively high quality of life,
in which the citizens live in forested areas with sporting and leisure structure (the superquadras) flanked by
small commercial areas, bookstores and cafes;

The Brazilian capital is the only city in the world built in the 20th century to be awarded (in 1987) the
status of Historical and Cultural Heritage of Humanity by UNESCO, an agency of the United Nations. It
also holds the distinction of waiting the shortest amount of time to be designated a World Heritage Site of
any UNESCO entry, which occurred just 27 years after its completion in 1960.

Planning policies such as the locating of residential buildings around expansive urban areas,as well as
building the city around large avenues and dividing it into sectors, have sparked a debate and reflection
on life in big cities in the 20th century.

It was designed as antidote, not mere antithesis, to the evils of capitalist Brazil: the basic units, huge
apartment blocks, all equal, same faade, same height, same facilities, built of the same materials, on
columns, with garages; preventing the hateful differentiation of social classes, all families sharing the same
life together.

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 Negative aspects:
After a visit to Braslia, the French writer Simone de Beauvoir complained that all of its superquadras
exuded "the same air of elegant monotony," and other observers have equated the city's large open lawns,
plazas and fields to wastelands.
The disperced, homogeneous dormitary settlements, set in a green
city with a new system of traffic circulation, would eliminate the street,
the public space and the urban crowd of traditional Brazilian cities.

But the first generations of Brazilians rejected the defamiliarizing

intentions of the design, rejected the negation of urban Brazil. They
found the same facades monotonous, producing not equality but
anonymity. They rejected the mixing of social classes, as igniting
conflicts between irrevocably different life styles and values. Without
streets and crowds Brasilia was cold.

Many upper beaurocrats moved out to build ostentatious houses to

display their wealth and negate the modernist aesthetic. The elite
found the same together intolerable and abandoned the intended
egalitarian social clubs to form exclusive, class-based private ones.

Planned for only 500,000 inhabitants, Braslia has seen its

population grow much more than expected.

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SETTLEMENT EVOLUTION - A CASE OF BRASILIA
 Nothing dates faster than people's fantasies about the
future. This is what you get when perfectly decent, intelligent,
and talented men start thinking in terms of space rather than
place; and single rather than multiple meanings. It's what you
get when you design for political aspirations rather than real
human needs. You get miles of jerry-built platonic nowhere
infested with volkswagens. This, one may fervently hope, is
the last experiment of its kind. The utopian buck stops here.

Utopia
Thus the Brasilia tour
Robert Hughes, The Shock of the New, Episode 4: Trouble in
ends

THANK YOU

SLIDE - 21 Krishna chand CH, 10011PA003

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