Debate the impacts that mobility has on the urban environment, reflecting on the differences between walkable, dense, and diverse European cities, the peripheral urban expansion observed in Latin American metropolises, and the automobile-oriented North American suburbs;

 

Analyze the profound transformations brought about by autonomous vehicles and shared mobility services;

 

Understand the impact of large-scale public transport projects, projecting how they will transform the neighborhoods they pass through.

 

These were some of the main objectives of the Urban Mobility and Sustainable Development summer course. Held in July, with a total load of 80 hours, it was aimed at undergraduate students from different programs: Business Administration, Economics, Computer Science, Law, and Engineering.

 

The course was immersive, with activities throughout the day, for two weeks. Fifty-six students enrolled. Matheus Kasabkojian Lima, a 20-year-old Economics student from São Paulo, reports that the summer course provided a different immersive experience. "We had classes in the morning and field visits in the afternoon. Thus, we came into contact with the reality of the city." Family influence led him to become interested in the course, he says.

 

"My father works in the real estate market and has always been very proactive on the issue of urban mobility, better and more efficient cities, but I never went after understanding more about the subject. I found the course syllabus interesting and, combined with this interest in knowing a little more about what my father does, I decided to enroll in the elective course." The expectation was met: "The combination of theory and practice worked very well."

 

In addition to the field visits, the course also innovated by incorporating an activity at the FabLab, the Insper prototyping lab. Students participated in a dynamic where they prototyped the design of a city using Lego-type blocks, tapes, and plates to represent buildings, streets, and other urban elements.

 

From scenarios involving changes in mobility infrastructure, students altered the constructed models and discussed their implications on the number of trips and modes of transportation, and how these changes would influence building densities and the location of housing and jobs, deepening their understanding of urban planning and transportation.

 

Classes on the street

 

The professor responsible for the course was Adriano Borges Costa, Program Director of the Center for Cities Studies – Insper Arq.Futuro Lab. Classroom activities took place in the morning. "During the semester, it is challenging to take students out of the classroom. In this case, the immersion was total, allowing us to explore the contents in the classroom with more expository classes, guest lectures, and discussions with students."

 

The afternoons were dedicated to exploring the city as a laboratory, spending time immersing in the urban environment. "We went out to learn about some cases related to urban mobility in São Paulo: we went to discuss road safety and data usage with professionals from iFood at their headquarters; we visited the João Dias station of the metropolitan train system, built from a partnership between Brookfield Properties and CPTM; and we went to a construction site of Line 6 of the Metro, the largest infrastructure project in Latin America," summarizes Borges. "We closely saw initiatives to improve public transport and efforts to decarbonize urban mobility."

 

Mobility is directly related to how people live in cities, their choices for living, studying, working, and seeking various services, including health, physical activities, and entertainment. The course provided an immersion into all these aspects of life in metropolises and the future perspectives of how people interact with their mode of mobility. "Mobility is part of defining the future of cities, whether they will be denser or more dispersed, whether they will become safer or more sustainable," says the professor.

 

Impact of car usage

 

The course debated urban, environmental, social, and economic aspects of car usage, considering topics such as: streets as partially public goods, the inelasticity of roads, proposals for urban tolls, demand induced by car usage, the place of private vehicles in urban mobility, challenges related to transportation funding, and different modalities for hiring, monitoring, and providing services. Additionally, it discussed the challenges for metropolitan mobility management and the role of public transportation in urban mobility.

 

Giselle Vieira de Melo, a 23-year-old born in Fortaleza (CE) and a student of Mechatronic Engineering, learned about the course through a friend's recommendation, who chose it for the advantage of completing hours in a short period. "That recommendation led me to learn about the elective course, but what really motivated me to take the course was the central theme: the challenges of sustainable urban mobility, a subject of great interest to me," she says.

 

"Moreover, classmates from previous semesters always spoke highly of the course, but surprisingly, the classes exceeded my expectations. The quality of the lectures, the depth of the discussions, lectures with companies and experienced representatives, and field visits perfectly aligned with the theoretical content and course proposals made this experience truly incredible."

 

Historical perspective

 

The student's goal was to explore various aspects of the theme through theoretical classes and practical fieldwork. "I achieved this goal thanks to interactive and dynamic classes, in addition to the advantage of this elective course taking place during the holidays, which allowed me to fully dedicate myself to the content and in-depth discussions about the future of urban mobility and its impact on the sustainable development of cities," she says.

 

Thus, she explains, it was possible to better understand the expected impacts on the urban environment resulting from investments in transportation and how these investments can be used to promote more sustainable and equitable cities.

 

"The program also provided me with a broad view, both from a historical perspective by comparing with cities in other countries and in terms of the economic and social impacts of ongoing mobility actions," the student concludes.