Brasília
Brasília is the capital city of Brazil. It is a planned city, and was built in 41 months from 1956 till inauguration on April 21, 1960. The construction of the city was ordered by President Juscelino Kubitschek. The main urban planner was Lúcio Costa, chief architect of most the public buildings was Oscar Niemeyer, and landscape designer was Roberto Burle Marx. The city plan was based on the ideas of Le Corbusier.
The city construction did not stop with its inauguration and is still running according to the original plan which, by law, must be followed. The plan specifies what zones are residential, what zones are commercial, where industries can settle, where official buildings can be built, the maximum height of buildings, etc.
The former capital of Brazil was Rio de Janeiro, and the resources tended to center around the southeast region of Brazil. While in part the city was built because there was the need for a neutral federal capital, the main reason was to promote the development of Brazil's hinterland and better integrate the entire territory of Brazil (although some say the real reason was to move the goverment to a place far from the masses). Brasília is approximately at the geographical center of the Brazilian territory. Already in Brazil's first constitution from 1891 was it defined where the federal district should be placed.
Niemeyer's CathedralBrasília is situated in the Federal District, Distrito Federal. The city is designed in the shape of an airplane, despite the fact that Lúcio Costa insists he shaped it like a butterfly. Housing and offices are situated on giant superblocks, giving it a non-pedestrian scale. Since the city was designed around the advent of motor transport, pedestrians have to take long journeys to move from one point to another, but on the other hand the beautiful landscape makes the trip pleasant.
The city was originally planned for 500,000 inhabitants, but has grown to about two million including satellite cities today.
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External links
▪ Official Brasilia site http://www.brasilia.df.gov.br/
▪ Informative Brasilia page http://www.uoregon.edu/~sergiok/brasil/brasilia.html
▪ Another informative Brasilia page http://www.geocities.com/TheTropics/3416/bsb_aug1.htm