GREEN UNDER GRAY: tensions and transformations in EPZ 9 under the road project of Moema Tinoco da Cunha Lima Avenue, Natal / RN
Environmental Protection Zones, socioenvironmental attributes, road projects, Moema Tinoco de Cunha Lima avenue,Natal.
This thesis approached the theme of the socioenvironmental attributes of environmental protection zones which affect and are affected by road projects inserted in metropolitan dynamics. The motivation for this work came from observing recurring occupations in environmental protection zones (EPZs) by road projects, which implied in the suppression of relevant socioenvironmental attributes. More precisely, it was identified in the 2000s that the EPZ 9, located in the northern zone of Natal, Rio Grande do Norte, when receiving fractions of the road project for the Moema Tinoco da Cunha Lima avenue, with metropolitan incidencies, generated many socioenvironmental conflicts with potential to compromise the objectives of its protection. In the face of this problem, it was questioned: how were the socioenvironmental attributes considered in instruments of urban planning and in road projects which had some kind of incidence over environmental protection zones? It was assumed that, even though advances were observed in the protection of EPZs in the scope of territorial planning, the socioenvironmental attributes of these zones were not taken in consideration regarding their urbanistic dimension, with their specific aspects at road project level, nor their respective effects in the process of sociospatial transformations impulsed by the reffered project being taken into consideration. This resulted in the compromising of the protection objectives of those EPZs and the success of implementing urban mobility projects. Considering what was exposed, the object of study of this thesis was delimited by the socioenvironmental attributes of the EPZ 9 related to the strokes of the road project, legal framework and urban dynamic. The objective was to comprehend the approach towards the socioenvironmental attributes of the EPZ 9 in the road project of the Moema Tinoco avenue, starting from the urbanistic dimension of the road project, urban and environmental legislation and the transformations in soil occupation and use in the EPZ 9. In the theoretic-methodological field, the main references are the studies of Raquel Tardin (2008), as to support the analysis of the socioenvironmental attributes, and Jan Gehl (2013) as a basis for the analysis of the road project in its human dimension. Both analyze the space from the relation between man and nature. This thesis is structured in three chapters and a conclusion. The first chapter shows the theoretic-methodological references which lay foundation for its analysis. The second shows the characterization of the socioenvironmental attributes and the process of the social recognition of the EPZ 9. The third chapter approaches the road project over the EPZ 9, discuting notoriously the effects and tendecies in the transformation of the use and occupation of the soil in the EPZ 9, influenced by the road project. Lastly, the conclusion shows that, even in the face of the advances in the protection of EPZs in the scope of territorial planning, the socioenvironmental attributes are still not being recognized enough in the conception of road projects, weakening both environmental protection and the functioning of road projects.