The university and metropolitan planning: an innovative experience

Abstract

Abstract: The Federal University of Minas Gerais (UFMG) has been carrying out an experience of metropolitan planning in Belo Horizonte, Brazil, since 2009, involving a significant number of faculty and students. In this paper, we highlight some of the innovative aspects of this planning process. We stress the specificities of a planning experience conducted under the auspices of the University in an attempt to move beyond both its disciplinary and academic boundaries. Therefore, we emphasize the participatory dimension in which the University team is engaged along with civil society. We also describe proposals that put the environmental concern at the forefront of metropolitan restructuring and the efforts to materialize them through a Green and Blue Weft (Trama Verde e Azul - TVA). Finally, we discuss our understanding of planning as a political process beyond the institutionalized public policy practice in an attempt to give voice and visibility to different ways of seeing and making the metropolitan region.