Environmental impacts of sprawled residential settlements: Transport diseconomies in São Paulo

Abstract

This research addresses the issue of sustainability of high-income monofunctional urban structures sprawled within the city, considering as case study Alphaville Barueri residential condominiums in the metropolitan area of São Paulo. The aim was to investigate how these spatial structures are truly sustainable by checking their environmental efficiency according to their mobility behavioural pattern. The methodology used was to calculate the estimated transportation diseconomies produced by these sprawled urban structures through their quantification and establishment of monetary value to three indexes of environmental costs - fuel consumption, air emissions and time in congestion - and then to compare the results of the study case (the Alphaville Barueri residential condominiums) with the results of three control areas (the districts of Morumbi, Alto de Pinheiros and Pacaembu), which have been defined according to their similarity of urban design and socio-economic profile, but with different location taking into consideration the centre of the metropolis. The results pointed out that the Alphaville Barueri residential condominiums are not environmentally efficient in accordance with the defined criteria, when compared to the results of all three control areas, even if one of these areas, Morumbi, showed to be less environmentally efficient than all areas, including the case study.