What is it about?

Brasília, designed by Lucio Costa in 1957, today lies at the heart of a thriving metropolitan region, the Distrito Federal. From its origin in the 1950s it has proved to be a pragmatic and successful response to the challenges of urban development. The Distrito Federal had a Human Development Index of 0.874 in 2010, close to the UK (0.9) and France (0.88) and well above the Brazil average of 0.74. Is it sustainable in the sense of the diverse and productive cities - high-density and mixed-use - which we understand form the foundations of metropolitan regions with the highest HDIs? No. Costa’s vision, however, incorporated the most utopian assumptions about urban life in the 1950s: transport, the balance of public and private life, and accommodation for various degrees of financial and social status. The utopian nature of his original vision is in contrast to the current developer's city, of anonymous blocks without public realm. His original concept laid the foundations for the thriving metropolitan region today.

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This page is a summary of: Brasília: Life Beyond Utopia, Architectural Design, April 2016, Wiley,
DOI: 10.1002/ad.2050.
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