Land use supply and demand models for integrated simulation of urban sprawl in the Sao Paulo state cities

• Grant number: 25/00667-2
• Support Opportunities: Scholarships in Brazil - Post-Doctoral
• Start date: April 01, 2025
• End date: March 31, 2027
• Field of knowledge: Applied Social Sciences - Economics - Growth, Fluctuations and Economic Planning
• Principal Investigator: Carlos Roberto Azzoni
• Grantee: Sara Rebello Tavares
• Host Institution: Faculdade de Economia, Administração, Contabilidade e Atuária (FEA). Universidade de São Paulo (USP). São Paulo , SP, Brazil
• Associated research grant: 24/01097-2 - Sustainable growth accomodation for State of São Paulo Cities, AP.CCD

Abstract

The evolution of integrated modeling for land use and transport subsystems (LUTI) has expanded the potential applications of this analytical toolkit (mathematical, statistical, and computational models) as a support tool for decision-making in the formulation and evaluation of public policies aimed at sustainable urban and metropolitan development. These policies focus on mitigating the challenges posed by socio-spatial inequalities in access to opportunities for activities, as well as their resulting mobility patterns and socio-environmental externalities. LUTI econometric models aim to simulate locational decisions based on changes in the accessibility levels of residential, industrial, commercial, and service zones, under the premise that places with greater accessibility become more attractive and thus have higher chances of developing in terms of occupation and densification.In practice, the urban dynamics of Brazilian cities involve various phenomena, such as sprawl, segregation, and fragmentation, due to fluctuations in land values arising from changes in the built environment and interventions in transport infrastructure and services. From this perspective, adopting LUTI modeling in ex-ante evaluations of urban public policies should promote greater effectiveness in forecasting the future emergence of socio-economic and environmental externalities, posing significant methodological challenges.Aiming to generate new methodological and phenomenological insights specific to medium-sized cities in São Paulo, this postdoctoral research plan seeks to develop and apply supply-and-demand models for land use that allow for the representation of determinants and the simulation of the interrelations of locational decisions made by different socioeconomic groups and productive sectors. These models aim to enhance the evaluation of integrated urban public policies for interventions in land use and transport networks, revealing their impacts on resulting urban and metropolitan socio-spatial processes.