The Constitution requires that every city with more than 20,000 inhabitants be endowed with a master plan for development and urban expansion, and that private property observe its provisions. In addition, to ensure proper use of urban land, it authorizes municipalities to make subdivisions and building compulsory. The City Statute offers municipalities various tools for managing urban land and for real estate value capture. Through agreement with the landowners, the Statute also allows the Local Authority to directly promote land subdivisions or construction on idle land, replacing original properties by new units of equal value.3 The Urban Land Subdivision Law submits any urbanization to an urban project compatible with the master plan, based on guidelines established by the municipality, in which various duties can be outlined for the developers, such as the allocation of public lands and the implantation of urban infrastructure.4 The Land Regularization Law facilitates the integration of informal settlements into urban land planning and requires that this be done through appropriate urban design.5 HOW TO FOSTER THE COMPACT CITY The revitalization of public space in Brazil is subject to a set of known but difficult to implement measures and a necessary revision of concepts. In the first universe, it is necessary to prevent the formation of new subdivisions and condominiums far from the urban perimeter, focused on the private car. To this end, the perimeter of urban expansion areas should be outlined in the master plan, and applications for subdivisions whose execution proves to be inopportune or inconvenient should not be granted permission. The absolute priority should be the occupation of existing lots and the recovery of degraded areas, in order to promote the best possible use of the installed infrastructure. In the case of idle lots, it is important to raise taxation based on the value of the land, and reduce or eliminate taxation on building, in order to discourage the retention of land as a store of value and to stimulate its occupation. Degraded areas, in turn, may require land redevelopment operations to generate public areas, and the amalgamation of old lots, thus enabling the construction of higher buildings. In both cases, it is necessary to revise and possibly eliminate building restrictions that prevent the occupation of the lots at high density, and which make public transport and
394 2. Federal Constitution: “Art. 182. […] § 1 The master plan, approved by the Câmara Municipal, mandatory for cities with more than 20,000 inhabitants, is the basic instrument of the policy for development and urban expansion. § 2. Urban property fulfils its social function when it meets the fundamental requirements of city ordinance expressed in the master plan. […] § 4 – The municipal Local Authority, by means of a specific law for any area included in the master plan, is allowed, under federal law, to require the owner of un-built, underutilized or unused urban land, to promote its proper use, under penalty, successively, thereof: I – compulsory allotment or construction; II – progressive urban and territorial property tax over time; III – expropriation with payment through public debt securities […].” 3. Law 10.257 / 2001: “Art. 46, § 1. A real estate consortium is considered to be the way to make urbanization planning, land regularization or renovation, conservation or building construction viable, whereby the owner transfers the property to the municipal Local Authority and, after completion of the works, receives, as payment, real estate units duly urbanized or built, with the other units remaining incorporated as a public asset. “