Cycling advocacy in São Paulo: influence and effects in politics

Abstract

This chapter seeks to contribute to the debate about cycling policies by examining the struggles that help bring cycling to the political agenda in Sao Paulo, Brazil. Advocaty for cycling infrastructure in São Paulo started in a context in which the urban form was already dominated by automotive-oriented transportation infrastructure. The initial political mobilisation for bicycling also occurred at a moment of political instability in the 1980s during the re-democratisation of the country, with the cycling agenda reaching the higher level of institutionalisation after one of the most massive protest movements in the history of Brazil. This chapter explores the physical infrastructure not only through a policy and planning perspective but also by considering the social infrastructure in civil society that made these changes possible. The fragility of the physical infrastructure, given its subsequent decommissioning after a turnover in political administration, raises our awareness of the vulnerability of many infrastructure transitions and the need to think through a lens of spatial justice when considering the linkages between physical and social infrastructures. It is colcluded that the implementation of hard infrastructure as part of the city’s provisioning is an outcome of complex and longstanding manoeuvring.